


new things in an old language

by bigspoonnoya



Series: where the night goes & companion stories [5]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Babies, Character Development, Established Relationship, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Raising children, Realistic, it's 30k words of kagehina having and raising a kid, yep
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-02
Updated: 2015-12-22
Packaged: 2018-04-29 13:03:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 24,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5128619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bigspoonnoya/pseuds/bigspoonnoya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fatherhood, one step at a time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. step one

**Author's Note:**

> this story is a commission piece to be posted in three segments of ten thousand words. it's established relationship, probably the most realistic thing i’ve ever written, ridiculously self-indulgent, and lots of fun, i hope? for someone other than me and like, four other people. 
> 
> warnings for this fic: swearing, references to prior relationships (this fic has both past hinayachi and kenhina), mentions of sex, mentions of bad parenting, and frank discussion of legal discrimination against gay people in japan. but there’s no actual homophobia in the fic, because it’s too SAD, and not what i wanted to write. this fic is about two people who love each other raising a child together. it's heartwarming!!! I SWEAR!!!!
> 
> it’s the (hopefully) last story in my series that started with “where the night goes” and picks up four years after where that one shot left off. if you haven't read that fic, you might miss some references, but you should still be able to read. enjoy!

They’ve been sitting in the waiting area at Sendai’s city hall for twenty minutes when the last brave strands of Hinata’s self-control snap, and he makes the joke—the most obvious joke in the world, he knows it, he’s maybe even a little ashamed of it, but he can’t help stuffing his face into his hands and letting it giggle out of him:

“ _Hinata Tobio_.”

The embarrassed tremor that wracks Kageyama, slumped comfortably in the chair beside his, only doubles his laughter. “Shut up!” He whacks Hinata’s arm weakly, trying to bat the giggles out of him. There aren’t many people waiting near them, but the ones that are give them a dead-eyed look. Hinata really doesn’t care.

“But isn’t that what we’re—”

“This is just in case you croak!”

“What, you think _I’m_ going to die, what if _you_ die—”

“Shut up, you know exactly what I’m talking about, it’s how you convinced me to do this.” Kageyama slumps further in his seat and Hinata watches him, done laughing. He can tell Kageyama isn’t really _mad_ or anything, but his grumpiness is a little fishy and annoying. 

“We don’t have to do it if you don’t want to,” Hinata says out the corner of his mouth, matching that grumpiness. Kageyama blinks at him in surprise.

“Of course I want to.” Clearly he hadn’t thought two seconds about how dismissive he’d sounded. Hinata’s nose wrinkles, and a now apologetic-looking Kageyama leans toward him, voice lowered. “I just think it’s sort of shitty that this is our option.”

“Well, you didn’t want to move to Tokyo where we could get a certificate—”

“Fine, but it’s weird that you’re going to be fucking your adopted son, right?”

Hinata stares at him for a moment. Some of it is true and obvious—that this isn’t fair, because their lives aren’t fair, because the world isn’t fair. But some of it… he narrows his eyes. “Are you just mad that I’m adopting you and not the other way around?”

Kageyama’s face scrunches up defensively. “No!”

“Kageyama,” he says, laying a teasingly sympathetic hand on his boyfriend’s arm. “It’s just because I’m older, I _have_ to—”

“I’m not mad about that!”

“Sorry you’re not the seme you think you are.”

“We’re in public.”

“You’re the one that’s talking about incest!”

A third voice joins their bickering, “Hinata-san?” A middle-aged woman in a suit stands at the door to the waiting room, looking vaguely familiar to Hinata’s distant memory. She catches sight of him and pauses. “Hinata-san.” And she waves them over. 

“Kato-san!” Hinata greets her, and she gives him a shaky smile; they follow her down a hallway, Hinata dragging Kageyama behind him until he’s shaken off. “This is Kageyama, my…”

“I know, your mother told me everything,” says Kato-san, stiff but not unfriendly. She warms up a little when she says, “I haven’t seen you since you were a boy, I almost didn’t recognize you. But you have your father’s hair.” 

“I’ve heard that.” They keep winding through the halls of the government building, Kato-san keeping a brisk pace. Kageyama lags behind but lengthens his stride at the mention of Hinata’s dad.

“Did you know Hinata-san?”

Kato nods. “He and Hinata’s mother and I all went to school together.” Hinata throws Kageyama a skeptical look, like, _what is with you and my dead dad,_ but Kageyama continues to be… Kageyama, and not get what’s weird about his behavior.

Kato leads them into an office with her surname in small lettering on the door. “We really appreciate this,” Hinata tells her earnestly, as she takes a seat and they settle into the chairs opposite her desk.

“It’s perfectly legal.” She looks up at them, papers in hand. “I’ve… never done this for anyone in your situation before, but everything is the same. Once it’s completed you should be able to act as one another’s next of kin. Hospital visiting rights, inheritances…” She passes a packet of paper to each of them. “By signing these, you, Hinata-san, agree to enter Kageyama-san on to your family register as an adopted child.” She hands them each a pen. Nodding, Hinata flips through the packet, looking for a place to sign. “You, Kageyama-san, relinquish your family name and agree that a change noting the adoption will be made to your former koseki.” 

It takes Kageyama a moment to register that they’re waiting for his response—he has the paperwork across his knees and stares at it. Then he hears the silence in the room and glances up to find Hinata and Kato watching him patiently. 

Hinata knows Kageyama wouldn’t like it with another person in the room but, he sort of wants to kiss him. Just on the cheek, for reassurance. Kageyama is giving up more than Hinata is taking on and he seems lost, even if this tie to his family was essentially severed years ago.

Kageyama catches up to the moment, nodding, and clicks his pen. “Yeah, let’s do it.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This all starts two months earlier, with Hinata leaving.

“Where’s my tie, Kageyama?”

“I don’t know.”

“It has blue and yellow stripes—”

“I know, I haven’t seen it.”

Hinata starts pulling up the cushions in the living room. From where Kageyama sits on a stool at the kitchen island, he can see the apartment unravelling along with Hinata: cushions upset, drawers thrown open, piles of newspapers slipping to the floor. He guides another bite of curry into his mouth while Hinata whines under his breath, having exhausted his search in the living area. “It has to be somewhere,” he says, popping to his feet and pacing, ignorant to the trail of destruction left in his wake. 

Kageyama leans back over the counter to glance at the kitchen clock. “You’re going to miss your train if you don’t leave soon.”

“I can’t leave without my tie!”

“Why not?”

Hinata flaps his arms for emphasis. “Because I’m going _on TV_!” 

“Who says you have to wear a tie on TV?”

“Because I always _do!_ ”

His cheeks are tinged red, his hands shaking. Kageyama spies the nervous quiver in his chin and the sheen in his eyes and thinks, _oh shit._ He lowers his chopsticks and struggles to keep his expression neutral as they stare at each other, Hinata broaching tears or some other explosion, Kageyama tensed in anticipation. Kageyama swallows. Out the corner of his eye he can see the suitcase sitting by the door, while everything hangs on a moment.

Hinata wails and collapses to the floor, knees to his chest. “I’m not going! I’m calling the station and I’m quitting and I’m going back to work at the local station forever, and it’s going to be great,” he nearly screams, voice muffled by his legs. _Quitting_. Kageyama rolls his lip in his teeth and carefully sets his curry on the counter. This is worse than usual.

“You don’t mean any of that,” he says slowly.

“Of course not,” grunts Hinata’s muffled voice. He looks up at Kageyama, small face red and serious. “What if I throw up on one of the athletes?”

“When was the last time you nervous-puked?”

“Four years ago.”

Kageyama raises an eyebrow. “Actually, that’s more recently than I thought.”

“You’re not helping,” Hinata whines loudly, head thunking back to his knees. 

Kageyama climbs off his stool and, with a little bit of stiffness that definitely wouldn’t have been a problem five years ago, lowers himself to sit on the floor in front of Hinata, who glares at him over his knee. It’s cute. Kageyama’s jaw tightens. “It’s not like you to be afraid of a challenge.”

“I’m not _afraid_ ,” Hinata snaps.

“Then why are you backing down?”

“I’m not backing down?”

Kageyama leans toward him. “If we don’t leave in the next two minutes, you’re going to miss your train. And you’re sitting on the floor whining.”

Hinata gives him such an intensely sour look that his little chin starts to tremble—and then he screeches and flings himself to his feet. “All right! Fighto! Let’s go Tokyo!” Kageyama snorts and carries his bag to the car for him.

On the drive to the station Hinata has calmed down considerably, but he keeps slapping his hands against his thighs in the passenger seat and generally—fidgeting like a madman. When he’s not watching the road, Kageyama observes him out of the corner of his eye, electing not to comment on it. That’d only aggravate the problem, he suspects.

Hinata slams his head back against the headrest and groans. “You know, I feel like the older I get the harder it is to just run straight into big scary things without thinking about it. What’s with that?”

He feels himself smiling a little. “It’s called maturity.”

“What, just because I’m an adult, I have to stop being—stop being—”

“Reckless?”

“Afraid of nothing,” Hinata contests, thrusting a finger toward him. Kageyama bats it away without taking his eyes off the road.

“You were always afraid of things, dumbass. You did them in spite of how scary they were.” Hinata sits back, arms over his chest. He can’t argue with flattery. “It’s just harder now because… millions of people are watching you.” Kageyama regrets mentioning this because Hinata immediately screeches and puts his head in his hands, and the only thing he can do to fix it is awkwardly pat his partner’s shoulder while keeping his other hand on the wheel.

When they get to the station Hinata has about a minute to dash and make the train (which he will, because he is as fast as ever), so Kageyama just pops out of the car long enough for them to exchange a quick hug in the parking lot right outside. People probably think they’re brothers or cousins or something. He watches Hinata sprinting up the stairs into the station, suitcase bouncing behind him.

This isn’t the first time since they started cohabitating that they’ve spent a few nights apart, but it’s the first time Kageyama has been the one left behind. He thought maybe it would remind him of back when he was single and spent every night alone, but that was several years and an apartment ago. This place has only ever been _theirs_ and it aches for Hinata’s presence, he finds. It’s not as welcoming when it’s so quiet. 

Lying in bed that night he tries to sleep right in the middle of the mattress, but finds he can’t relax unless he rolls back toward his side, and then he feels weirdly unsettled knowing Hinata’s space is empty, even if he lies with his back to it. He wakes up feeling exhausted.

_Our newest correspondent, Hinata Shouyou, is a former high school volleyball star who once competed in this very tournament. Hinata-san visited the stadium in Tokyo today during the first round._

“You look better without the tie,” Kageyama informs the image of Hinata filling their television screen that morning. He look almost exactly as he had when he left here yesterday, though maybe his hair is neater (his producer’s doing, no doubt), and he wears a sport jacket and button-down, which Kageyama has seen him in more than once but he still finds kind of funny. He sips his coffee and turns up the volume as Hinata starts to talk about the history of the Spring High, gripping the microphone tightly. It doesn’t sound rehearsed or nervous even though Kageyama knows it’s both of those things, because he’d been there for the rehearsal and the nerves.

 _Formerly the competition actually took place in the spring, but in the last twenty years it’s moved to now, late January._ Kageyama grins into his breakfast bowl, stirring the raw yolk through rice. _And now, we’ll interview some of the stars of today’s top teams, and a coach—a good one, a personal favorite of mine._ He snorts. He remembers what Hinata had told him a couple months ago, when he first got this job: “They say I’m not a very good journalist,” (and here he pouted fiercely), “But that people seem to enjoy watching me anyway? And that’s why they gave it to me.” Kageyama has seen his broadcasts before and knows exactly what that meant, but watching Hinata converse excitedly with a teenage ace about his broad jump, being charming and knowledgeable on his very first nationally televised outing, it hits Kageyama again, and he thinks, great. Now all of Japan is going to fall in love with him. 

After his hilarious and mostly uninformative interview with Ukai, Hinata trudges through the stands and crouches to point the microphone at a little girl, maybe four or five, and Kageyama’s movements around his breakfast stall. Hinata grins broadly, asking, _Are you rooting for anyone here today?_ “My brother,” says the little girl. She has a butterfly clip in her hair and holds her mother’s hand out of frame. _Are you having fun? “_ It’s loud,” she says. Hinata laughs. He looks happy, like he has the entire segment, but now it seems to bubble through his voice. _If you’re loud too it means your brother can hear you better. Can you give me a practice cheer?_ The girl raises her arms into the air and squeals. _That’s great! He’ll definitely play better!_ Kageyama lifts his coffee back to his lips. It’s probably nothing; he wills away the lightness in his stomach.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hinata “unpacks,” which means flinging the contents of his suitcase into the dirty laundry. “Next time you should totally come with me,” he tells Kageyama, lying on his back on the bed with his hands folded on his stomach and his eyes half-closed like some old man. “Old man,” Hinata snorts, tapping him on the shin with a shoe. Kageyama opens his eyes all the way.

“Don’t…”

“Stay awake while I talk to you if you’re not an old man!” Hinata plunks down beside him, pushing the suitcase off the bed. He feels funny, excited, his hands are shaking a little. “I have a cool story to tell you.”

“I didn’t sleep well while you were gone,” Kageyama mutters, reaching for Hinata’s fingers and seeing the shaking. He glances up, brow furrowing, and Hinata gets the feeling that his face is giving away a lot right now. “What’s up?”

“So you know how in Tokyo I visited Daichi-san and Suga-san?”

“Sure, yeah.”

Hinata bites his lip, he can barely contain himself: “They’re moving to Shibuya.”

Kageyama stares up at him as if waiting for more. Hinata squints, how can he not… “Shibuya? They’re moving near the clubs, so?”

“ _Shibuya_ was the first district to issue union certificates to same-sex couples,idiot,” Hinata informs him, flicking his forehead. Kageyama is frowning. “You remember? It was a while ago now but it was a big deal.”

“How long?”

“Um, ten years, I think.”

“Ah, yeah, it would be because ten years ago I thought I was going to die alone.”

“ _Tobio_ ,” he whines, thunking forward to press his face into Kageyama’s stomach. It’s a little bit softer than it used to be and that makes him laugh. “The point is.” He turns his head so his voice isn’t muffled. “They’re going to get one of those certificates! And it gives them like, the same protections as a married couple. Mostly. I think.” He smiles at Kageyama, cheek against the fabric of his t-shirt. _Hint. Hint._ Kageyama blinks down past his chin at him.

“I’m not moving to Tokyo.” 

Hinata makes a retching sound and throws himself away from his stomach pillow. “You didn’t even think about it!”

“It’s too expensive and my job is here. Nakajima-san is retiring soon.” That successfully distracts Hinata from his tantrum.

“Wait, seriously? The head coach is retiring, does that mean they might—you’ve been there a long time.”

“They might,” Kageyama confirms, pulling their tangled hands toward him to examine Hinata’s.

“That would be incredible. You would be a great head coach, you could get them another championship. It’s been forever…” 

Kageyama shrugs but there’s a little smile on his lips that suggest he’s amenable to the idea. He lifts Hinata’s palm to his lips and presses a little kiss there. The gesture makes Hinata’s breath catch in his throat, his chest tightens reflexively.

“Would you marry me, if we could?” It’s funny, when they ran back into one another that autumn a few years prior, Hinata can remember saying something like, _I don’t think marriage is for me_. And—it isn’t, but not for the reasons he’d once thought.

Kageyama’s mouth falls open for a moment before he replies, “Of course.”

“Okay.” That exchange sits between them, Hinata grinning ear to ear and Kageyama staring up at him, face reminiscent of computer loading screen. “We could do an adult adoption, too, it gives you legal rights too.”

“So what, you become my kid?” Kageyama deadpans.

“Actually, you’d become mine.” The little smirk melts from Kageyama’s face, which is as satisfying as always. “The older person has to adopt,” Hinata titters, flopping back to lie beside Kageyama.

“That sounds ridiculous.”

“It’s _good,_ it means if one of us dies the other one would get to keep the apartment and all our stuff.”

“So all we have to do is die and then it’s like we’re married.”

Hinata laughs into Kageyama’s shoulder. “I guess it doesn’t really change much.” It’s comfortable against him, he feels contented to be home, lying in his own bed, with his own personal heated body pillow, in the middle of the afternoon. His trip was so hectic, so much to experience and think about, just in his conversations with Daichi and Suga alone. He swallows hard. “But it’s not just legal stuff, you know.”

“Hmm?” Kageyama sounds sleepy. Hinata senses a nap in his future. The naps are a new development, but he looks cute when he’s snoozing so Hinata has decided to allow it.

“Daichi and Suga were talking about kids, too.”

He doesn’t look at Kageyama when he says it, he _can’t_. Maybe on a practical level it was stupid to fall in love with someone before finding out if they really want the same things in life but it’s not a choice he made, or anything, and if he had he still would’ve chosen Kageyama. But he wishes he had mentioned it in more-than-passing, more than just “some day I’d like,” so that when he looks up and says _I think I’m ready now_ it’s not such a surprise. His heart beats fast and he wonders if Kageyama can tell, maybe, probably, he’s attentive to Hinata in a way that he can’t be with other people. Something about the rhythm they’ve fallen into over the years, the one they forgot and then picked back up again so easily.

“Kids?” Kageyama echoes. It’s hard to tell what the emotion in that voice is—surprise, indifferent, maybe a little (Hinata really hopes not) disdain.

“Yeah…”

“How’s that going to work?” Kageyama says this like they’re planning to conceive a baby themselves and Hinata rolls his eyes.

“A surrogate and an egg donor, idiot.”

“Oh. Right, sure.” 

A silence falls between them. Hinata swallows, waiting. With his head on Kageyama’s shoulder he can’t really see his expression so he sits up a little and now they’re looking each other right in the eye. It must be clear now he’s expecting more of a reaction from Kageyama—which isn’t something he wanted Kageyama to know, crap—

“I think I’m going to take a nap,” Kageyama says, his big blue eyes blinking in Hinata’s face.

“Oh, yeah, sure,” Hinata says, scooting away from him. Preparing to let him nap in peace. He unlinks their hands and Kageyama seems bummed that Hinata isn’t going to join him, but he can’t think of napping right now, when his face is burning up. He climbs off the bed and ignores the disemboweled suitcase on the floor.

As he’s hopping toward the living room, Kageyama sits up a little and says, “We can do that koseki thing if you want.” Hinata stops in the doorway. Kageyama’s mouth twitches and he clarifies, “The adoption.”

“Yeah?” Kageyama nods, and Hinata grins on his way out. _Walking before running_. One thing at a time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They leave the papers, neatly signed, with Kato-san in her little office, and exit city hall together into the sunny plaza.

“Even if you don’t go by my name, we’re family now.”

The water in the fountain is shut off for the winter and it makes for a sad scene, disrupting the beautiful weather. It’s chilly while they’re walking to the car and Kageyama helps Hinata tug on his beanie.

“We were family before,” Kageyama tells him.

“I meant legally!”

“I can’t explain a name change to my coworkers without lying more, and you hate when I lie about us.”

“I didn’t even want you to change your name,” Hinata replies, suddenly rather annoyed, because Kageyama has latched on to the wrong bit of the conversation, and because he made Hinata feel guilty in the process. Sure, he’d made a stink when Kageyama first told him that the coaching staff at the university knew him as _Kageyama-san’s girlfriend_ , but that’s a frustration more with—the world, not Kageyama himself. His partner’s intense desire for privacy has always meant that he’d rather hide their relationship than be honest about it and risk drawing attention to himself, and to them. Hinata has never been so… easily subdued by practicality. And it could be today or tomorrow or the next that someone at his new job finally asks, _hey, Hinata-san, what about your love life?_ And he has to make the same decision that didn’t give Kageyama a moment’s pause. The people from his old station never cared, but now he’s at a national syndicate. That changes his visibility, what it means to put him on screen. Things are getting better for people like them every year, but that doesn’t guarantee him acceptance.

They reach the car and he watches Kageyama fumbling for his keys. This wasn’t even what he’d intended to talk about. “It was never really _family_ when it was just the two of us, though,” he says, a clumsy segue.

Kageyama unlocks the car with a click. “Your mom and Natsu.” Hinata plunks into the passenger seat and Kageyama into the driver’s. 

“Well, yeah, but they don’t live with us.” Natsu doesn’t even live in Sendai anymore—there’s been talk of her moving home after graduation but he doesn’t know what to expect, or how Okaasan will take it if she stays down south.

“Do you want to get some champagne or something on the way home?” Kageyama asks, apparently not very interested in this talk of family, which makes Hinata sink into his seat nervously as they pull into the street. Maybe he should wait a little while but—but the longer he waits the more abrupt it will feel when he does mention it. Shit. 

“Champagne?” he echoes vacantly.

“Yeah.” Kageyama’s eyes are on the road. “To celebrate. The koseki thing.”

“ _Oh._ ” Kageyama is being… sweet. Even though you can’t hear it in his voice or see it in his expression. Hinata smiles to himself, thinking of the little thought process he must have gone through, logicing his way to champagne: _we’re family now, that’s important and special for us as a couple, important and special couple things need to be celebrated, what do couples do to celebrate? Champagne._ How typically Kageyama, approaching romance like a system of equations, it has never failed to make Hinata laugh, which is probably more romantic than any of his formulated gestures. But Hinata goes along with them anyway, most of the time; there’s nothing wrong with champagne and gifts of chocolate and flowers occasionally appearing for no other reason than Kageyama needing to express himself. He was never good with words so he falls into cliches and that means more, really, the way he fills up their empty significances with meaning of his own. 

“We can do champagne if you want,” Hinata says, giving him a smile, and Kageyama nods. “But uh, you know, now that we’re family…” Kageyama cranes to see over the sedan stalling in front of them. Hinata appreciates the jawline, the fading bruise on his neck (the phrase “too old for hickeys” simply doesn’t register with Hinata). It keeps his heart from racing too much. “We could have a family.”

There’s a long pause of Kageyama squinting out over the dashboard, and his expression doesn’t shift when he says, “What?”

Hinata swallows and pulls off his beanie to twist in his hands. “I want to try having a kid.”

Kageyama slams his fist into the horn and it blares. “ _Move_! Shit! The light says go.”

The sedan finally lurches forward and they follow suit, the silence in the car nothing short of unbearable. And it lingers—he wonders if perhaps Kageyama hadn’t heard over the noise, if he needs to repeat himself or if Kageyama just doesn’t _want_ to hear him, because the idea is so far from his life plan that… that he’s going to start packing his bag the moment they get home. 

He blinks until that thought is gone. A waste of headspace. He’s been dumped a fair number of times in his life—symptomatic of his refusal to quit at anything—and he knows a little about the warning signs, what the boot looks like coming from a distance. What he has with Kageyama, it won’t turn into that. But it could get messy.

“You’re like a gay lemming.”

Hinata looks up from the dashboard and Kageyama is glaring at the road. “Excuse me?” _Gay lemming._ He doesn’t know what that means but it sounds offensive. 

Kageyama’s tone peels into acidity, revealing frustration that sounds old and worn-through. “You go to Tokyo, you spend two days with Suga and Sawamura, and suddenly you want marriage—” Hinata could punch him for that one. “—and now that that’s—basically done, whatever—you want kids!”

“Excuse me, I’ve always wanted kids, you know that,” says Hinata, twisting in his seat to better confront his belligerent partner, because, _really_?

“You can’t even keep a plant alive, how will you—”

“That was _four years ago_ , and it was an ugly plant, and our baby wouldn’t be ugly—”

“Where the fuck are we going to get this not-ugly baby?”

“I’ve told you, egg donor, surrogate!” Kageyama opens his mouth to reply but gets distracted by a car passing them and swears. Not that he’s fooling Hinata, who demands, “Do you even want kids?”

They roll into a red light and Kageyama briefly leans forward to bang his forehead against the wheel. “I don’t know!” Hinata feels something in his chest loosen—that isn’t a definite _no_. And Kageyama doesn’t lie to be nice. Hinata leans back in the seat, voice a little quieter. 

“Then why are you so mad that I do?”

“I’m not mad.”

“You seem pretty mad.”

Kageyama lifts his head just in time for the light to turn green. He hits the gas. They are almost home already, they’ve argued about this almost the entire way back. “I’m not mad. I swear.” Hinata finds that a little hard to believe, but he lets it slide. “I don’t want to do this today, all right.”

“Okay,” says Hinata weakly.

“It’s not like there’s a rush, we’re only twenty-nine.”

“Yeah.”

“And we haven’t been together that long.”

“Four years…”

“Well—out of what, forty or fifty?”

This unshaken confidence in their future—Kageyama says it like it’s a given, them staying together—it reassures him enough that he stuffs down his questions and nods. They’re pulling into the parking lot outside the apartment complex, anyway, and Kageyama is _right_ , they have _time_ , even if the thought of waiting makes Hinata pound his fists into his thighs absently while they park. Even if Kageyama had agreed right away, it won’t just make a baby appear in his arms; this will demand patience no matter how fast it happens. And then there’s parenting on the whole to think about. 

 _So I’m going to sit on it,_ he announces to his subconscious. If there’s one thing that can battle his impatience it’s his determination! Right. 

“You were really mean before,” he informs Kageyama as they’re getting out of the car. Kageyama ducks his head, practically pleading guilty.

“Yes.”

“So?” They start up the stairs on the exterior of the complex.

“I’m sorry and I love you.” Hinata turns around to kiss his cheek (he’s on the higher step so he can actually reach) but then Kageyama is shouting, “Shit! The champagne!” and sprinting back down to the car. He stands on the balcony outside the apartment with his elbows on the railing and waves him goodbye, then goes inside, humming a little quieter than usual. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

With them, arguments happen. Arguments have happened since before they fell in love, while they were in the midst of it, and they most certainly continue now in days of loving comfort. It’s enjoyable, their own form of communication, rarely cutting deep enough for anyone to come out wounded. Mostly Kageyama would qualify the topics of debate as mundane things—where to put the new bookshelf, how to assemble the new bookshelf, what books they should buy for the new bookshelf—but seeing as they’ll argue about anything, given the time and place to do it, their repertoire is vast. 

Even when they veer into the territory of a real _fight_ , because it’s always hard to tell, nine times out of ten when he checks in Hinata will say, _what, you thought I’d be upset about_ that?

So Kageyama doesn’t lose sleep over their fights.

Which would be why he is halfway to snoring the night after they sign the koseki paperwork, when he hears, low and familiar, “Kageyama.”

He doesn’t open his eyes. “Yeah.”

The mattress shifts beside him. Hinata must sit up or something, but he’s too groggy to roll over and look, and it might give Hinata the idea he’s up for a conversation right now. “We don’t have as much sex as we did when we were first dating.” 

Kageyama sighs into his pillow. Shit. He had tried to explain that it was the _champagne_ that did it, and tomorrow night they could go for real, but right now?

“Go to sleep.”

“Do you think that’s normal?”

He rolls on to his back, eyes still closed. His head hurts, the beginning of something nasty. Hinata’s chin snugs against his shoulder. “It’s normal. Go to sleep.”

“Are you bored with me?”

“No.”

“Do you think it’s good when we do have sex?”

“Yeah.”

“Are we getting old?”

“Mhm.”

“Did things turn out how you wanted?”

“They would if you’d go to sleep.”

“I hope I die first, of the two of us.” 

Kageyama pries his eyes open, and gropes for the light on the bedside table. Hinata’s head rests against him and his gaze is cast vacantly down the bed. He only blinks and shifts away when Kageyama sits up on his elbows. “What’s wrong with you right now?” 

“I just feel weird. And sad.” Hinata lies back, searching the ceiling. Kageyama has the sinking sense of what this is about, and— “I don’t understand why you don’t want to have a baby with me.” For all the deep questions, this is the first time during this episode he’s heard true fear in Hinata’s voice.

He’s awake now, really awake, reaching for one of Hinata’s hands. “It’s not like that, that I definitely don’t want to—”

“If you don’t, I think you should just tell me, so I don’t get my hopes up.” Kageyama knows that tone, when Hinata tries to sound reasonable while fighting off tears. One of those silly, stupid, proud things about him.

What he doesn’t know is how to explain himself and stand his ground—when Hinata cries it’s like a curse on Kageyama’s willpower, he gives in every time. “It’s not that simple.” His hand laces into Hinata’s and Hinata squeezes it.

“But it is, you want kids or you don’t—”

“That’s unrealistic,” says Tobio, a little harshly, and Hinata’s gaze drops to his lap. Shit. “I mean… there’s all this legal shit to sort through.”

“So we’ll sort through it!”

“And then raising it. How are we going to…”

“Like everyone else.”

His hand tightens around Hinata’s. “We aren’t like everyone else, Shouyou.”

“Things are getting better—they get better every year, they do. And anyway, I don’t care what people think,” Hinata says, chin out and his eyes watery, and it does pluck at Kageyama’s heartstrings—but believing really hard isn’t enough, not for this.

“It doesn’t matter that you don’t care.” Hinata’s face twists in pain and he leans forward to snug against Kageyama’s shoulder. Instinctively Kageyama lifts a hand to stroke his hair. “If we have a kid…” 

This sentence, he doesn’t know how to finish it, not for lack of ideas but for lack of wanting to put them in words. He thinks of how he navigates everyday with attention to his privacy, keeping the most precious part of his life hidden from coworkers and family and friends; vague words and politely declined invitations to dinner. But at least he knew what he was getting into—he’d had years to come to terms with it, who he is, the peculiar burden of identity. The rest of the hypothetical arrives in his imagination instantly: how could they maintain their privacy when meeting teachers, or coaches, and when they went places together, the three of them, would people even know them as a family? He wouldn’t know what to tell a child, to protect it from that. It would take a special kind of parent. 

“A bunch of other people’s stupid opinions aren’t going to stop me from being happy.” He doesn’t even see Hinata’s face when his partner says this, but it makes his heart ache. _I love him._ Sometimes he just, remembers. 

“I don’t want to do this in the dark,” he decides, and starts climbing out of bed. “Do you want tea?”

Some minutes later they are kneeling at the table in the living room, steaming cups sat between them. Hinata doesn’t touch his for the longest time; his face is unusually small, his mouth a thin, tired line, and the swollen redness of his eyes causing Kageyama pain.

“You want to talk about this now?” he asks, as if them getting out of bed and making tea and sitting here with the lights on like they’re about to have a business meeting weren’t confirmation enough. Hinata nods.

“I can’t stop thinking about it.”

“Okay.”

Hinata stares at him. _He asked you a fucking question, didn’t he,_ Kageyama reminds himself. He blows on his tea, spends half a second wondering how to phrase it, and then dumping the explanation between them: “When I told my parents about the adoption, they said they don’t want to see me anymore. Officially.”

Hinata’s mouth pops open. “Oh… you didn’t…”

“That was our first time speaking in a year,” he continues, loudly clearing his throat. “I don’t really know what a good father is. Neither do you—do you remember much about the first ten years of your life? Enough to know what you should do?” Shrugging, he lifts the tea to his lips. “So.” The liquid is still too hot when he tries it and it burns his tongue.

“That’s why you don’t want… wait, do you not want kids, or are you _afraid_?”

“I’m not afraid, I just—it would be hard enough raising a kid and being—and then to pile shitty parenting role models on top of—” 

Hinata grabs his hand over the table and it startles him into silence. He has that look in his eyes, the fierce one, it still makes Kageyama’s mouth go dry after how many years now. “Would you ever treat your child like your parents treated you?”

“Of course not, but—”

“Then why is that even a concern? Why worry you’ll behave like them when you’re nothing alike?” Hinata sits back, but keeps his hand wrapped around Kageyama’s. The apple of his throat bobs. “If we have questions, we can ask my mother. She’s the exact kind of parent I’d want to be.” _So stubborn_ , he thinks, watching Hinata search him for some kind of opening. “You still haven’t answered my question.”

Kageyama pulls his hand out of Hinata’s to rub his eyes, and grunts. _Do you want kids._ He is shoving down a memory.

“That’s not an answer either!” Hinata leans toward him over the table, forcing his way into Kageyama’s line of vision.

“You’re really not going to accept ‘I don’t know’ anymore, when it’s only been twelve hours?”

“I might if you can promise me that’s the real answer, putting aside all the underestimating yourself and parent baggage.” It’s so pervasive, the picture in his head, he’s going to…

“You’re insatiable,” he groans.

“You like that!”

“In bed, I like it in bed.”

Hinata grins, a refreshing glow in his cheeks, after the sadness. “No, you like it all the time.” _Do you want kids_. And all he can think of is that stupid broadcast a couple months ago, where Hinata talked to the little girl, and how he hadn’t been able to name what he’d felt but it was something, something was there. Something _is_ there. Hinata’s grin wobbles in uncertainty, at the pained look on Kageyama’s face. Why is he trying to lie about what he wants? Because it would be easier to deny himself? He’s done that before—he tried to deny himself _this_ , the apartment and the shared bed and the half-assed legal certification of togetherness, all of it, when he had felt himself pulled toward Hinata four years ago. He had nearly walked—nearly _run_ _—_ away then too. And why—because he doesn’t believe he can be trusted not to fuck up a good thing, especially when other people are involved, counting on him? _You’re not fourteen anymore, idiot._

Hinata has stopped smiling and waits for his answer with baited breath. He looks beautiful, even with his puffy eyes and sniffly nose. Kageyama slides his hand across the table between them, his palm upright, fingers reaching toward Hinata.

“Yes.”

The most marvelous expression breaks out over Hinata’s face, and he lobs his hand into Kageyama’s. “How am I supposed to go to sleep _now?_ ”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“You’re rushing into this.”

“I’m not rushing in, you want them too!”

“I want them, I don’t want them to appear magically out of thin air. We’d probably find out they’re cursed or something.”

Their jog stalls as they hit the crosswalk at a large intersection; Hinata huffs a couple of breaths and wipes his face clumsily on his sleeve, Kageyama hops in place to keep his momentum.

“Even if we start planning now—” Hinata huffs again. “—it could take us a year to get everything arranged—” Huff. “—and then the gestation period is nine months.”

“Gestation period,” Kageyama snorts.

“That’s what it’s called! I’ve been reading about it!”

“You mean you didn’t know it takes nine months?”

“No, I—of course I— _Kageyama_ ,” he whines, as the light changes and his jogging mate takes off across the street. “It’s a long process, why shouldn’t we start now!”

The familiar streets of Sendai roll by as they pound down the sidewalk. It’s early, not yet seven o’clock, and the neighborhood remains tucked in half-darkness, no other pedestrians aside from the stray fellow runner. Hinata finds the quiet kind of dull, but Kageyama likes to start his day with calm roadwork, so they switch off between morning and evening jogs. 

“So how are you proposing we get started?” Kageyama asks. The sound of their feet on the pavement and nothing much else in the air does make Hinata feel peaceful, he supposes. It’s not the worst thing.

“Finding the egg!”

Kageyama takes a couple heaving breaths (they can’t talk and run like they used to) before replying, “Don’t you think we should wait a couple months?”

“In a couple months all the good eggs could be gone!”

His partner’s brow furrows. “I mean, it would be rude to ask her now.” 

Hinata racks his mind to remember what about _now_ would make a potential donor want to hold on to her stuff. He settles on, “Valentine’s day isn’t _that_ big of a holiday.”

“What are you talking about?” See the confusion in Hinata’s face, Kageyama’s strides slow. “I meant, her graduation is next week.”

That stops Hinata in his tracks. Her graduation? “What are _you_ talking about?” Now they are standing in the middle of the sidewalk glaring at each other, and it’s decidedly a good thing that there isn’t anyone around.

“I’m talking about Natsu,” says Kageyama flatly, giving Hinata this look that screams, _how are you not getting this?_ Which strikes him as a preposterous attitude to take when one is making no sense.

“Natsu?” Hinata echoes. “What does my sister…”

It dawns on Kageyama that Hinata trails him by about three mental leaps and he shifts his weight. “Your sister has eggs.” _Oh._ “They’re the closest thing to you having—and if we used my, uh—”

“It would be like our baby.” 

With the film of sweat cooling on his skin, a drop rolls by his eye and he blinks it away, gaping at the conclusion his tongue has reached. The truth of Kageyama’s plan washes over him, astonishing and profound, like before that moment he hadn’t really grasped what they are doing but—there it is, the rocky path to a tiny person made from the two of them, opening up before him, less-traveled but promising unthinkable views.

Kageyama wipes his brow, eyeing Hinata, who probably he looks like he just got hit by a train, but it was… a good train, if there could be such a thing. “I assumed when you were talking about this before, you always meant Natsu.”

Hinata starts down the street at a dreamy pace, and Kageyama catches up with him. “No, I hadn’t even…” People have always remarked on how alike he and Natsu look—and she carries all the same genes as him, right? Somewhere in her DNA? He suddenly wishes he had paid more attention during science in school, so he could know if there’s a chance the baby will have his smile and Kageyama’s eyes. That would be a miracle. More than a miracle.

“But you know what I mean, about not asking her the week she finishes university.”

Hinata panics: “Do you think she’ll say no?”

“She’s your sister, you tell me.” He gapes at the concrete sliding beneath their feet. In that instant it becomes impossible to remember anything Natsu has ever done for or against him—but they have a good dynamic, and she has always found his relationship with Kageyama delightful and amusing. 

“What if she thinks it’s weird to have a baby with her brother’s boyfriend?”

“She won’t have to carry it,” Kageyama points out. “Just the procedure. It wouldn’t be her kid except biologically.”

Hinata dwells on this for a moment, and then begins to nod. “Yeah, yeah. It wouldn’t.”

“So we’ll invite her to visit in the early summer and ask her,” Kageyama decides. 

Still dazed, Hinata has forgotten this part of the conversation. “Wait, why can’t we just ask her next weekend?” 

“It’s her graduation. We wouldn’t want to make it about us.” He glances sideways at Kageyama; sometimes Hinata thinks he overcompensates for his former self-centeredness by being too timid about what he wants. It’s sweet to see him try so hard to be considerate, but often it takes Hinata’s insistence to get him to stand up for himself when the rationale isn’t clear and straightforward or—volleyball-related. Kageyama would never let one of his setters sacrifice themselves for the benefit of a spiker, but in his own life he’s the first person to surrender his needs. Hinata learned early on that when they argue, he throws down his sword at the first accusation of selfishness; so it’s a card Hinata rarely plays, he would rather fight another hour than think he won an argument unfairly.

He swallows, ruminating, but he can’t think of a delicate way to put it: “I think we should make it about us.” They’ve stopped at another intersection and Kageyama turns to squint down at him. “I mean, as long as we don’t stand up in the middle of the ceremony and shout it at her while she’s getting her diploma.”

Kageyama sighs and scratches his head but doesn’t answer right away. They’ve crossed the street and into a park by the time he pipes up again. 

“I don’t like it.”

“Natsu’s really laidback, I don’t think she’ll care!” The more he thinks about it, the more sure he becomes that she’ll say yes. It should be years before she starts thinking about kids of her own, and it could win her back their mother’s favor, which she’d lost with her decision to stay in Tokyo permanently.

“Have you thought for even a second about what you’ll say to her?”

“Uh… ‘Hey, Nacchan, can I get your egg so we can make you a nephew?’”

Kageyama snorts, and only half in derision. “Like I said, you’re rushing into this.” He might as well be saying, _I don’t want to rush into this_ , which makes Hinata… annoyed. He can’t see the meaning behind the objection, what the actual problem is.

“One of the really hard steps is probably taken care of! All the more reason to go ahead with it.”

The little smile on Kageyama’s face slides into neutrality again. He keeps his gaze fixed on the path ahead of them. The sun has nearly risen, beams of orange streaming through the cracks between buildings. “If you aren’t going to wait for Natsu,” he says. “Wait for me.”

Hinata wants to reply, _what on earth are you talking about, what am I supposed to be waiting for?_ But he can remember a couple of nights ago, when he had finally gotten that answer out of Kageyama, that one incredible word— _yes_ —and how much it seemed to pain him to admit it, in spite of it being true. With that in mind, his excuses don’t seem so weak anymore.

So he shrugs and nods. Kageyama nods back. There’s a nip in the air and early summer feels like eons from now, but the time will pass quickly. It always does when they’re happy, and he could waste months of his life imagining a baby with red hair and blue eyes. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But waiting, for Hinata, is always easier said than done.

Kageyama knows this and, mustering all the trust and loving contentment they’ve built up over the past four years, he tries not watch his partner too closely when they arrive in Tokyo for Natsu’s graduation the next weekend. Even that assumes he’d be able to tell—in all likelihood, if Hinata breaks his promise, it will be spontaneous, an impatient urge he can’t suppress. Kageyama’s lack of control over the situation leaves him feeling mostly ill as they step off the Shinkansen and head toward their temporary residence, the high-rise apartment of an old friend.

“He was out of town when I was here in January,” Hinata chatters happily at his side, not dwelling on the one-sided nature of their conversation. “I think he was in America, maybe he brought us something? I sort of want a cowboy hat. Ooooh, I haven’t visited him since he moved into this new building, it’s huge!” Indeed, they’re standing at the foot of a huge glass skyscraper; Kageyama checks the address on his phone, and then glances up the sheer face of the structure with a sigh.

“I know there’s money in gaming, but this seems excessive.”

Hinata gently punches his arm, a grin splitting his face. “You know, I have a big long theory about why you’re still so jealous of Kenma.”

“Shut up,” Kageyama mumbles, pushing by him into the building, but Hinata follows at his elbow. The lobby of Kozume’s apartment building is all sleek modern lighting, and features a strange black marble fountain with an unidentifiable water source.

“It’s partly because we were together when I was really young, and secretly you’re very romantic, so you’re all like,” (and here he shoves his hair down in an unflattering impersonation), “ _‘Grunt, me and Shouyou are meant-to-be, grunt, we should have always been together, grunt! Our youths were stolen!’”_ Hinata shrugs back into himself, still grinning. “Which is silly, of course, because back then we weren’t the same people we were when we got together. But _also_ ,” he adds, sticking a finger in Kageyama’s face as they sweep into the elevator. “He’s the only other setter I’ve ever dated. And I think that’s what really messes you up.”

“Shut up,” says Kageyama again, weaker.

“But if I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a thousand times, I don’t compare your tosses while we’re doing it.”

“I hate you.”

“Mhm—you should focus on being a little less red-in-the-face, we’re almost to the twenty-sixth floor.”

Kageyama presses his chilly hands to his burning cheeks and the rest of the ride passes in silence until he catches Hinata’s smile out the corner of his eye and they burst out giggling at the same time.

When the elevator opens on to the darkish corridor it’s quiet enough Kageyama is reminded of spy thrillers. Hinata bounds down the hall ahead of him; his duffel bounces against his back. “This building is amazing!”

“This is a hallway.”

“But like, a hallway in a hotel! A _fancy_ hotel, too.” At least’s Hinata eagerness has distracted him enough that he doesn’t look too embarrassed when the apartment door opens and Hinata essentially attacks Kenma, his indistinct shouts echoing down the hall.

“Don’t _kill_ him, Shou—”

“He’s fine!”

Kenma’s arms fold around Hinata and he manages to give Kageyama a nod in greeting over the orange head between them. “Kageyama. Also hey.”

He bows a little, eyes on the floor after fleeting contact with Kenma’s. Joking aside, he hates how right Hinata is about his discomfort around Kenma, though it usually only persists for the first hour they’re together. And anyway, it’s not unheard of to be nervous around your significant other’s ex-person, no matter how long you’ve known each other or what positions you may have had in common during your high school volleyball days.

Hinata releases Kenma from his crushing embrace and kicks off his shoes before sweeping into the apartment. “Look at the view! Kageyama, that’s Tokyo Tower! See it!” The floor-to-ceiling windows around the living room appear to open on to a balcony, and out from there the city expands in every direction.

“I know Tokyo Tower, I lived here for four years.” Kageyama gives Kenma another bow as he shuffles over the threshold. Their friend looks different from the last time Kageyama saw him—maybe nine months ago now? A year? His hair was about the same length back then (just long enough for a short ponytail) but more of a turquoise color. Now it’s pale pink. He’s surprised but not very, since Kenma’s hair has been every color imaginable in the years since they started seeing each other again; he had explained that maintaining it got easier once he could pay someone to do it, and that in his adulthood he’d learned the value of standing out.

“The view is nice, but it takes forever to get up to the twenty-sixth floor,” Kenma says, with a little yawn. Kageyama notes that he still appears to be in his pajamas, though it’s the early afternoon. He slips out of his shoes and indicates his overnight bag.

“Where do you want our stuff?”

“Uh, second room down the hall on the right.” Kageyama grabs the duffel strap from Hinata’s shoulder just before he swan-dives on to Kenma’s very large, expensive-looking sofa. “There’s a futon set up for you.”

“Thank you for letting us stay here, Kenma-kun,” he hears Hinata chime as he ventures down the long corridor Kenma had indicated. 

“You’re welcome whenever you want.”

“Natsu wouldn’t stop talking about how she’d never fit us and my mother in her and Ito’s tiny apartment, so I said we’d just get a hotel.” He pauses to stare into the bathroom, which has the biggest tub he’s ever seen in a private home, and then pokes his head into their room. Like the living area, it’s got a view, and it looks like the window probably opens on to the balcony as well. Hinata will like that. “But the ones near the university are so expensive, gwah.” Kageyama drops their luggage in the corner of their room, which looks like it might be Kenma’s workspace, if the three computer stations lining the walls are any indication. _The brain._ Kageyama smiles to himself and rejoins the two of them in the main room.

Hinata is now hanging upside down off Kenma’s couch while Kenma himself occupies a cushion on the floor and sips at a can of tea.

“ _Please_ tell me how Cyclops 3 is going to go!”

“My contract says I can’t talk about it.”

“Just the subtitle—”

“Shouyou, they’d fire me,” Kenma says, half-smiling. 

“But it’s _meeee_!”

“Making video games seems like a lucrative business,” Kageyama remarks, plunking down on the couch near Hinata, who tries to mess up his hair with a socked foot.

“Kageyama! That’s rude.”

Kageyama grabs his ankle and drags it toward himself, and Hinata squeals, flailing. “I’m only asking because—” Hinata’s heel nearly costs him an eye. “I know sports reporting and university assistant coaching aren’t. Lucrative.” They stop fighting and Hinata doesn’t move from his new perch, his legs in Kageyama’s lap, which counts as a victory.

Kenma watches them over his tea. His face is unreadable—that has never made Kageyama feel any _less_ awkward around him, for sure. “It’s good. I can afford this place easily. They offered me a promotion but I turned it down, too much traveling.”

“When did you move in?” Kageyama asks, just as Hinata demands to know, “What did you bring me from America!”

“It’s on my bed,” Kenma tells Hinata evenly, and just like that Kageyama’s lap is empty, Hinata’s little footfalls thumping down the hall. Kenma turns back to Kageyama. “Six weeks ago. But half my stuff is still in boxes in my room. Kuroo was supposed to help me unpack a month ago.”

“Kuroo?” Kageyma echoes. It’s been a while since he heard that name… but he can clearly see bedhead and a smug expression. “You still talk to him?”

“Our mothers are friends, but I hadn't seen him in years until a few months back.” Kenma flicks the top of his can idly, blinking at the rug. “Weird how meeting again sometimes puts old relationships in perspective. I guess you’d know.” Kageyama stares at him. It’s true, he understands that sentiment perfectly, but he still gets the feeling he doesn’t really know what Kenma means. This man is more than a closed book to him—he can’t even read the cover. It makes him wonder how Hinata ever did it, with how blind he can be toward subtlety. 

As if to reinforce his concern, Hinata leaps back into the room, clad in a cowboy hat too big for his head, and shouts, “Kenma, are you seeing anybody?”

“Uh…”

Hinata whoops and falls to his knees in front of Kenma, who has started determinedly looking away. “ _So?_ Who is it! Anyone we know!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It takes Kageyama another hour to pry Hinata away from Kenma’s place, and so they’re fifteen minutes late for dinner at Natsu’s apartment. Her middle-school-best-friend-turned-reliable-setter-turned-college-roommate, Ito, answers the door and gives them both ridiculous hugs. The whole place smells like Okaasan’s cooking and Hinata finds his mother, Hinata Hiromi in her understated fussiness, has taken over Natsu’s kitchen to deliver them a meal. His sister watches from the living room, which coincidentally isn’t too far from the kitchen, which isn’t too far from the rest of the place, because the apartment is indeed a closet. Hinata glances back at Kageyama and tries not to laugh at the sight of him banging one elbow after another on either side of the doorframe. 

They eat curry and Okaasan asks them—mainly Kageyama, she seems to be under the impression that he’s the more mature of the two of them, which always makes Hinata want to fight—the same questions she asks every time they see her.

“How is work?”

“Good,” Kageyama says.

“And your apartment?”

“Good,” Kageyama says.

“Do you go to the doctor?”

“Okaasan, everything is good and normal, we’re very healthy,” Hinata complains, pouting at her over the table. “Though, Kageyama is getting old and he takes naps now.”

“Is that true?” Ito snorts. 

“It’s—” Kageyama begins defensively, and then he shrinks. “Naps are good for you.”

Natsu grins down the table at Kageyama—Hinata leaps to find some clue as to her feelings about Kageyama, if she likes the two of them together, if she’d… His stomach flips. _No baby talk tonight._ But whenever he thinks about how they’re not supposed to talk about it, he immediately considers what it would sound like if they were, and he’s not very good at keeping the thoughts at the front of his brain from exiting through his mouth.

“Kageyama-kun is officially family now, Shouyou, I will ask him what I like,” says Okaasan. Hinata makes a face at her he made a lot back when he was seventeen.

Natsu asks around a bite of curry, “What do you mean, officially?”

He feels Kageyama glancing at him—that’s panic, probably, with how quickly it arrives. “I thought Okaasan had told you.” He scratches his chin and eyes his mother, who has conveniently decided to examine the remains of her dinner in this moment. “I guess not. Well.” He lays his chopsticks over his bowl; he wishes Kageyama would do it, but he senses that the man sitting next to him might be going glacial, with how frozen he is, so he shoulders this. Natsu gives him her full attention, her face interested and familiar in that uncanny way, not so far from what he sees in the mirror. Well, here’s one way to gage her feelings about them as a couple. “I adopted Kageyama a couple weeks ago. It makes it so we can inherit property if something happens to one of us, and… you know, in Sendai we don’t have a union certificate program yet.”

He realizes he’s been talking to table, and lifts his head to glance around at this, his family. He’s just registering the smile on Natsu’s face when she says, “So it’s like you got married? Was there a ceremony? You didn’t invite us.”

“Kageyama-san is your _son_ now?” Ito asks, leaning over the table, looking pleased with the thought.

“Technically! No ceremony, just papers.” Hinata elbows Kageyama as subtly as he can manage, trying to get him to see what he’s seeing, that this might be going… well.

Ito sits back, shaking her head in mock condescension. “You have to be firm with your son,” she tells him seriously.

Natsu nods along, grinning. “That’s right! Discipline him!”

“Otherwise he could turn out _wrong_.”

“Mmmhmm! He could turn out— _gay_.”

At this point Kageyama collapses over the table in laughter and Hinata goes with him and even Okaasan laughs, if more quietly than the rest of them. The chaos is punctuated by Natsu launching herself across the table to give him a bear hug, declaring her congratulations at the top of her lungs. 

The night goes on and occasionally Kageyama will meet his eye in the middle of a conversation and tap his watch, but time management has never been his forte, and only when Okaasan declares that she’s ready to sleep does he realize how late it’s gotten. The graduation ceremony is tomorrow and they don’t want to be dozing off in the middle of it. Kageyama gets roped into doing the dishes with Ito, while Okaasan thinks out loud about how “these two girls get by with only one bedroom” and everyone else keeps their mouths shut. ( _One step at a time._ ) 

Natsu latches on to his arm and starts dragging him toward the bedroom, insisting he help her carry out the futon for their mother. 

“When did you get taller than me?” he whines as he stumbles after her into the dark space.

“Like five years ago. You’re pretty thick.”

She flips on the light and he can see the small, crowded room she shares with Ito. It’s cozy but leagues from luxurious. Seeing her there in the corner dragging out a futon, he realizes he’s alone with his sister for the first time tonight—he can hear the voices of the others in the main room, but they have privacy. 

“Can you come help me? Like a little?” 

 _No baby talk tonight_. 

Except, Kageyama wouldn’t need to know. Not for two months, anyway—he could ask Natsu to play along, pretend he hadn’t already asked her.

He climbs across the room and starts tugging on the other end of the mattress, rolled up and lodged in a storage space at the bottom of the wall, where it doesn’t seem to want to leave. They tug together—no budging—and then again.

She had seemed so friendly toward them at dinner, so excited about the adoption, how could she refuse when she’d been so eager to be a part of their commitment? Wanting to attend a ceremony? _I know something better than coming to a wedding!_ he wants to shout. 

They give it another fruitless pull and Natsu pushes her hair out of her face. The hair that’s just like his.

He blurts, “Can I ask you something?”

She glances up, taken aback at the tone of his voice. “What is it?”

They go for one more tug and that does it—the force of the futon coming out of the wall sends them both tumbling backward. “What a pain,” Natsu groans. 

“We should’ve gotten Kageyama to do it.”

They start trying to get the futon off themselves and hoist it. “Niichan needs his big strong man to come rescue him, huh?”

“More like I rescue him!” he scoffs; Natsu laughs.

“What did you want to ask me, again?”

With a little bit of fumbling, they manage to get one of them on either end of the mattress, but Hinata pauses, holding his end to keep her from carry it on out. “I wanted…” Natsu tilts her head to the side. Rescuing Kageyama. Funny. “To ask you how it feels to be the first Hinata ever to finish university.”

She snorts and waves him off, answering simply: “It’s weird!” 

He feels himself unwinding as they maneuver the futon out into the living area, his pulse gradually slowing as he backs away from the edge of something he’d regret. Together they get Okaasan’s bed set up, and then he and Kageyama bid everyone goodnight.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When they arrive back at Kenma’s, their host greets them but heads to bed right away, apologetically complaining about having work at the sordid hour of ten o’clock. Kageyama shoos Hinata into the bathroom first and then takes his turn after, washing away a long day of travel and talk.

He comes back to their makeshift bedroom in a towel and sees Hinata’s small figure on the balcony, huddled in his coat. Tokyo glows under the dark sky. Kageyama throws on enough clothing that he won’t freeze, and steps outside to join him.

Hinata turns at the sound of the door and gives him a tiny, warm smile. Kageyama shuts the door and Hinata trips back toward him, wrapping himself around Kageyama’s broad torso and shoving his face right into the center of his chest. That makes it difficult for Kageyama to shuffle toward the railing, where he can better appreciate the view, but he manages. From this high up the traffic on the streets looks like rivers of multicolored light, white and red flooding the cracks between buildings.

After a few seconds Hinata’s head pops up. “You smell clean,” he sighs, hands sliding up under Kageyama’s shirt, making him shudder and push their mischievous fingers away.

“I don’t think your ex’s balcony overlooking all of Tokyo is the best place for that.”

Hinata lets go of him, leaning back against the railing. He’s quiet for a moment while Kageyama watches the city, then he claps his hands together. “Okay! Starting on the count of three you’re not going to call Kenma my ex anymore!”

“What?”

“One… two… three! Hey!” Hinata throws his arms in the air in celebration; Kageyama just squints at him.

“He _is_ your ex.”

“Technically, but—” The forced cheer flees Hinata, now his real concern is evident, his frown deep. “It’s all you ever fixate on, and it was one part of our relationship that ended. Eight years ago. Years before we even got together. He’s one of my best friends.”

Kageyama hangs his head, not having the energy to deny something so obviously true, despite the stronghold in his chest that—can’t accept it.

Seeing his hesitation, Hinata sighs and presses his forehead into Kageyama’s shoulder. “I don’t understand the problem.”

It’s ugly to say things one would rather not acknowledge even exist as thoughts in one’s head, which is why it takes Kageyama a moment to reply. His breath is white on the air. “You’ve known him almost as long as me. You always got along really well. Had a connection.” He catches sight of Hinata’s searching expression and has to look away. “If I were twenty-one and I fucked things up with you, I would never stop thinking about how to get you back. Eight years would be nothing.”

He turns his head. Hinata’s face is utterly serious, the tiniest line between his brows. “I thought you knew.”

“Knew?” Kageyama echoes, fear bubbling up through the center of him.

Then a tiny fist makes contact with his stomach and he doubles over. “That you and Kenma are _different people_! Bakageyama! Baka!” He stumbles back and Hinata is laughing, shaking his head. “You have to promise me you’re going to stop thinking like that. The fact that that’s what you’d do is the reason we’re together, nobody is ever going to be as nuts about me as you.”

Kageyama’s first instinct is to say, _seems likely._ But that’s exactly what a delusional person would think in response to such a statement, particularly a delusional person who didn’t realize _he’s_ the one who is madly in love with his boyfriend, not the entire world. “I promise,” he says shakily, still guarding his stomach before managing to straighten up. Hinata lays his arms along the railings and rests his head on them, smiling sideways at him. There isn’t really a word Kageyama knows to describe how he looks just then, but the feeling it evokes in him is privilege. Like… _shit, I’m lucky._

“I like you a lot,” Hinata says with his cheek against his arm.

“I like you too.”

“A lot?”

Kageyama steps closer and lays a hand over the warm expanse of Hinata’s back. “A lot.”

Hinata pops up and then there are palms cupping Kageyama’s cheeks, tugging him down, and the warmth of Hinata’s mouth on his makes him realize how chilly it is outside, all the way up here.

“What was that for?” he asks when Hinata releases him, hands sliding down the front of his chest.

“I just realized earlier it’s been thirty-six whole hours since I kissed you. That’s way too long.” He stares up at Kageyama, smiling and biting his lip and with the light from the city on his face, and Kageyama’s insides are definitely liquefying or something like that; Hinata bangs a fist against him, gentler than the one to his stomach. “Hey, did you know that Natsu is the first Hinata to finish university?”

“I didn’t,” he says, trying to laugh at how out of place this sounds. But the way Hinata says it, it’s like he thinks it fits perfectly with the rest of their conversation. 

“She is! I’m proud. We’re all really proud.” And he grabs Kageyama’s hand, tugging himtoward the door. They turn their backs on Tokyo. “Come on, let’s go inside. I have baby names to tell you before bed.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it’s 100% true that gay couples in japan will use the practice of adult adoption to gain legal familial rights. see [“koseki as a substitute for marriage" on wiki.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage_in_Japan\))


	2. step two

The third time Kageyama’s phone rings, the head coach looks at him and says tiredly, “Take it.”

On the first ring he’d hit the end call button after a second, and set the thing to silent—this isn’t the most important meeting of the year, but he takes his job seriously. The second ring, it buzzes noisily against the table, and he jams down the sleep button, avoiding the curious looks of his coworkers. They’re talking about the freshman class, a new setter. The head coach asks his opinion and—the phone rings again.

This time he glances at it out of anger, and feels himself soften at the sight of Hinata’s name and the weird contact picture (an upside-down selfie, which Kageyama has never seen before, meaning Hinata had probably nicked his phone to take it). He glances up and catches Coach Nakajima’s eye. His boss gives him a nod, permissive.

Kageyama waits until he’s in the hall and the door is closed behind him before he answers. “Is everything okay?” Three calls in quick succession like that, it could be bad.

Hinata must be nearly screaming into the receiver and Kageyama jerks the phone away from his ear.

“WHICH ONE OF US IS GOING TO BE THE MOTHER?”

“What the fuck!”

“ _Which one of us is going to be the mother?_ ”

“Calm down!”

“Kageyama, please—”

“What are you talking about?” Kageyama does his best impression of a patient person, but what kind of fucking question is that?

“I told my mom about everything today.” Oh. Shit. Suddenly he’s less puzzled. “And you know—I ran her through everything, how we have this plan, and how we asked Natsu to help and she said yes, so—and Okaasan didn’t say a word or move her face the whole time, it was like I was talking to a wall.” Kageyama swallows and leans against the door to the conference room. He’d been counting on having _one_ supportive grandparent. “And then after like—like _ten minutes—_ ” Kageyama gets the sense it was more like ten seconds, but still. “—she just says, ‘Which one of you will be the mother?’”

Kageyama pinches the bridge of his nose. “Shit.”

“I tried to explain, I swear, but she went on and on about how—babies need mothers, and if a baby doesn’t grow up without a mother it’ll be broken or something.” The strain in Hinata’s voice is heartbreaking. He trusts his mother—this is an unfamiliar but understandable concept to Kageyama. “And then… and then I got mad and I left because I’m stupid,” Hinata adds miserably. “She’s been so supportive about everything. I didn’t know what to say, I don’t know—I don’t know where this is coming from!”

“When she was pregnant that’s probably what they told her.” He finds it easier to stay calm when Hinata isn’t; he knows that a level tone and a little logic is usually enough to talk his partner down from hysteria. “Babies don’t need mothers, they need people who will love them and look after them. We can do that.” A beat of silence and, feeling he needs to do a little more, Kageyama adds, “A baby doesn’t know _mother_ and _father_ , it just knows _food person number one_ and _food person number two_. The surrogate will help with the milk. It doesn’t matter.”

Hinata sounds smaller when he says, “It feels disrespectful to tell her that.”

“She’ll have to persevere if she wants to see her grandchild,” Kageyama snaps. “We’re under no obligation to respect elders who treat us unfairly.”

A long pause; then, on Hinata’s end of the line, a giggle. “I landed a delinquent, didn’t I?” At least he’s happy again.

“Shut up,” Kageyama mutters, glancing back into the conference room through the windowed walls. He should rejoin them sooner rather than later. “You’re the real delinquent. What did you do to my phone?”

“Huh?”

“When you call me, this weird picture comes up—”

“ _Oh_ , I did that because, I keep telling you, you have to put a passcode on your phone!”

“ _Why._ ”

“Because it’s what people do, and there’s sensitive stuff on there—pictures of me, uh, parts of me—”

“I will talk to you at home,” Kageyama interrupts, and he hangs up to the sound of Hinata’s laughter.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Their living room has never been neat, but during the six week trial Hinata refers to as the Great Surrogate Search, the space reaches new heights of disarray: two laptops, a tablet, brochures from agencies and booklets containing legal information about surrogacy; old cups of tea and dirty chopsticks hiding between towers of paper; candy wrappers from the sweets they scarf down, always a sign of stress in the household. The deeper they dig into their desperation, the worst the mess becomes. Sometimes Hinata will shoot to his feet in the middle of a research session and start doing jumping jacks to burn off the anxiety, while Kageyama lowers his head to the table in silence.

But despite his occasional resignation, he’s not the first of them to admit defeat. One afternoon, Hinata is having an involved phone conversation with an employee at an agency and it escalates: “I don’t see why not… Our application is as good as anyone else’s…” He paces and then stops with his back to Kageyama. He rocks on his heels, his tone of voice growing higher. “We only want the opportunity…” A beat—then Hinata screeches into the receiver and tosses it over his shoulder with all his strength. Kageyama has to dodge it and it bounces on to the carpet behind him. He reaches back and taps the end call button.

Silence, for a moment. Steam might as well be curling out Hinata’s ears. Kageyama licks his lips, and idly straightens some papers where he sits at the table. Waiting.

Hinata wheels around and flops to his knees, wearing a terrific pout.

“I’m going to steal a baby.”

Kageyama blinks at him. “You’re not.”

“Where are we going to find a uterus?” Hinata groans, leaning over the table and disturbing g a couple of heavy directories; Kageyama snatches up a half-full cup to keep it from spilling.

“We’ll find one.”

“Are you sure we can’t just ask Natsu?” Hinata asks the tabletop.

“Natsu has given us enough.” A brief medical procedure and nine months of discomfort ending in intense pain aren’t equivalent requests—and they certainly can’t expect a twenty-two year old to surrender nearly a year of her life.

Hinata sighs his agreement, and rests his cheek on his forearm. “I don’t think we’re going to be able to go through an agency, which means…”

“It’ll have to be someone we know.” Kageyama had surmised this too.

Turning his head, Hinata peeks at him over an elbow. “How come you don’t know more women?”

“I’m a gay man, who coaches for a men’s volleyball team, and has trouble socializing,” Kageyama says slowly.

“Guuuh.”

“Why don’t you ask one of your ex-girlfriends?”

Hinata shoots him a look over the table like, _are you fucking kidding me?_ Kageyama shrugs. He doesn’t see what’s weird about the suggestion. Those women presumably like Hinata, even if things didn’t work out.

Hinata sits up again, having bounced back from his depressive moment, and eyes Kageyama with new suspicion. “That reminds me.” Kageyama starts gathering up the agency pamphlets to discard them. What a waste. “Hitoka-chan is going to be in town in a couple of weeks.”

He glances up, and finds Hinata watching him expectantly. “Did you make plans?”

“Yes, we’re all going to get dinner one night.”

Kageyama nods. “That’s good. I’d like to see her.”

He’s about to continue cleaning up but Hinata pops in his seat, thrusting a finger toward him. “Aha! You’re much less jealous of Hitoka than you are of Kenma! See—”

“It’s because I don’t understand how you two went out in the first place.”

“You’re so rude,” Hinata shrieks, and Kageyama watches him storm around the apartment for the next half an hour in an outraged tizzy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“A baby?” Yachi echoes; the shock of this announcement is enough that she can’t get her mouth shut all the way, sitting opposite her old friends.

It’s been over a year since she last saw them—back then they were moving out of Kageyama’s bachelor pad and Hinata had just settled into his career change, and now—a _baby_. But they look almost the same, sitting side-by-side, occasionally nudging each other or leaning over to mutter something about the restaurant.

“It’s a big change,” says Kageyama evenly. Yachi can still remember the day Shouyou called her, maybe four or five years ago now, to say he’d reconnected with Kageyama. She was walking home from the office and could heard the overwhelmed delight in his voice, which told her just how literally he meant this.

And it was… _amazing._ Neither of them had heard from Kageyama for years. And suddenly he had arrived, as if summoned, to spend the rest of his life with Shouyou. She’d known them both when they were fifteen, she’d watched them attack each other, grow together, succeed as a team. She knew all the pain and hard work that went into it.

She watches Kageyama reach over to wipe a drop of broth from the corner of Hinata’s mouth. _They’re the same as they were_. It’s not that she finds it hard to believe, only that she revels in it. _They did it. They figured it out._ She envies that.

“Who knows if we’ll ever get our baby,” Shouyou complains, swatting away Kageyama’s hand.

Yachi glances between them. “What do you mean?”

“He means that we haven’t been able to find a friendly agency to place us with a surrogate,” says Kageyama. Shouyou nods and lowers his bowl from broth-slurping height.

“They only want to serve married couples! It’s ridiculous!”

“It’s just Japan,” Kageyama murmurs. Yachi can tell he’s putting effort into being the level-headed party, though it doesn’t come naturally to him.

“It’s terrible,” Yachi offers, and Shouyou beams at her sympathy. It seems like that alone is enough to lift him from his annoyance, and he turns to her with bright eyes.

“How are you doing, Hitoka-chan? How is that firm you work for? Are you running it yet? What’s that thing you do called?”

“Art direction,” she replies, in a bit of a jumble. In the time she doesn’t see Shouyou, she always forgets how rapid fire his conversation can be. “I’m, um, the assistant head of the department now, so…”

“Congratulations,” Kageyama offers, as Hinata makes to get up and hug her over the table, nearly knocking their meals into their laps. Kageyama gives him a scolding that falls on disinterested ears until finally, Hinata settles back into his seat and stops making hysterical wordless noises.

“I’m just excited for her,” he tells Kageyama, with lip. “Hitoka’s art is really good! Did I ever show you—”

“The drawings she did of you? Like four times.” _Oh no._ She can feel herself turning pink(er). She leans toward Kageyama.

“Does he bring that up a lot?”

“You’d rather not know.”

“This is _so good_ ,” Hinata declares, of his ramen.

“Work is good,” she says weakly, hoping to segue.

Hinata nods, his attention rapt. “And what about your personal life? Is that good?”

“You sound like your mother,” Kageyama tells him under his breath. Hinata makes a face and Yachi giggles. She remembers Hinata’s Okaasan well.

“My personal life…” _What am I going to say?_ The longer she waits to finish her sentence the more she can feel them looking at her, wanting an answer, their concern growing. With _two_ pairs of eyes on you, and such intense ones at that—they exercise some kind of strange couple magic that makes her sweat. She doesn’t think she and Shouyou (or for that matter, she and anyone she has ever dated) put out such a distinct vibe. But perhaps that’s why they’re good together. “Um. I think…”

“Is everything okay, Hitoka-chan?” Shouyou asks, gentler now.

She laughs, nervously, and wrings her hands. “Tokyo is very big and I work a lot, is all. I’m sure it will get better, but at the moment, I feel… stuck, I suppose.” She sees Kageyama fidget at this word, _stuck_ , and she wonders what that’s about.

“Maybe you need a change,” Shouyou offers, as he maneuvers a bunch of noodles toward his mouth.

“Maybe you’re looking for something,” is Kageyama’s quieter, more intense suggestion.

“Maybe,” she agrees, mostly to appease those intense eyes. In truth, she doesn’t know what she needs. If she did, she would have taken care of it already. It’s this stumbling around in the dark, not understanding what she’s tripping over, that she finds truly frustrating.

“Maybe you should have a baby,” says Shouyou, and she feels her mouth fall open just as he starts to laugh—it was a joke. He was joking. But it’s another moment before she can chuckle with him. Kageyama _tsk_ s and jostles his partner for teasing.

After their meal, they go walking around the neighborhood, her and Shouyou in front and Kageyama trailing them a little, probably giving them time to catch up, just the two of them. But she notices—it’s hard not to—the way Kageyama’s gaze stays on the back of Shouyou’s head, and occasionally she’ll glance back to see the corner of his mouth turn up at something Shouyou has said, or a strange noise he’s made. She can see Kageyama enjoys being near the person he loves, for all the simplicity of it. The contentment radiates off him—it radiates off the two of them when they’re together. The tension in their relationship has gone slack, but the connection has stayed strong, and the knot tight. In their lives there is no walking home alone, no working late just for the company, no constant feeling of absence. She has seen less happy, easy, safe relationships; she is a child of divorce. And it’s sad, how great they are together, because they seem deserving of what other people take for granted, but they can’t get it.

They walk her back to her hotel and she’s about to go inside—and there’s this moment. She’s walking toward the lobby and drops her scarf, and has to turn back to retrieve it. And there behind her are Kageyama and Hinata looking at each other, smiling into one another’s faces, Hinata’s fingers on the sleeve of Kageyama’s jacket. It’s a moment that surmises everything she’d thought about them tonight and—she makes a sound, a gasp, and they both look at her and it’s… awkward, probably, but she didn’t mean it that way.

“You all right?” Kageyama asks, gruffly, but failing to hide the fact that he’s a little pink after being caught smiling at his boyfriend.

“I’m fine,” she squeaks. Hinata gives her a thumbs-up. “I’m—I’m really happy for you two!” Kageyama bows and Hinata’s head careens to the side. She hopes it sounds as sincere as it was.

“Thanks,” says Hinata, a little stilted, as she turns and rushes for the lobby, embarrassed of her own mouth. “Goodnight, Hitoka-chan.” She manages only a hurried nod in reply, before she dives inside.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“I hope we didn’t offend her,” Kageyama mutters, pulling the comforter off the bed. Hinata falls into his side, and Kageyama climbs into his, and then pulls the sheets back over them. Hinata is wearing an old Hirose High School t-shirt to sleep, one softened by a hundred washes, and Kageyama rubs his cheek against the sleeve as they’re settling in. Hinata giggles and reaches down to tweak his nose.

“We didn’t offend her.”

“You should stop bringing up those drawings.”

“They’re _nice_ ,” Hinata whines. Kageyama can’t argue with that; the little charcoal sketches Hinata keeps pinned above the desk are beautiful portraits, somehow perfectly true to the way he moves and smiles.

“She was definitely acting weird when she left.” Kageyama pulls himself up to kiss Hinata’s temple, then more, so he can tuck his partner’s head under his chin. The soft red hair tickles the bottom of his chin and he’s glad he thought to turn off the lights before they got into bed, because he doesn’t want to move.

Rubbing his face against Kageyama’s chest, Hinata lets out a tiny sigh. He’s tired, Kageyama can tell. Too tired to have an emotional conversation, so Kageyama presses another kiss to his forehead and starts pulling away.

“Let’s sleep.”

But Hinata doesn’t let him go, wrapping himself around Kageyama’s torso. “No, like this!”

“We’ll never fall asleep like this.” He fights not to let himself be too endeared, because he really means that _he’ll_ never fall asleep like this, and he doesn’t want to sacrifice his rest to being Hinata’s body pillow.

“Just for a few more minutes!”

“You’re ridiculous.” He can’t make that sound less affectionate, it’s beyond his power to pretend that he doesn’t look down at Hinata snugged against him and want to… “Come here,” he mutters, except he comes to Hinata instead, contorting to kiss him. Hinata makes a noise against him, and then laughs when he feels Kageyama’s lips on his jaw and trailing down his neck.

“I thought you wanted to sleep.”

“Maybe in a little while.” Kageyama pushes Hinata’s shirt away from his collarbone, and kisses him there. “If you’re not too tired.”

“I’m not too tired,” Hinata murmurs, his smile audible.

“We can be quick.”

“We don’t _have_ to be quick—”

Somewhere in the depths of their apartment, a cellphone rings.

Kageyama jerks away from Hinata, who is groaning, “It’s _midnight_ —”

“Is that yours or mine?”

“It’s mine!” He lets Hinata wiggle out from beneath him and the covers, and listens to his small feet pounding out into the living room. “Who is calling at midnight? Who is it?” Hinata sounds as excited as he is annoyed. The phone keeps ringing and he must catch it just before it goes to voicemail. Kageyama hears recognition in his voice when he answers. “Ah, hi! Is everything okay?”

A moment later Hinata returns to the bedroom, phone pressed to his ear. He covers the mic to say, “It’s Hitoka-chan!” But he scowls when he drops his hand to talk to her again. “I don’t understand what you’re saying? Are you sure everything is all right?” When Hinata’s close enough to the bed, Kageyama pulls him back down, wrapping a protective arm around his waist. “Hitoka…”

A touch is all he can offer in support when it’s impossible to make out this incredibly one-sided conversation. “What’s going on?” he murmurs, but Hinata just shakes his head, and turns away to better concentrate on whatever Yachi is saying.

“You’re… that’s—you don’t have to… Hitoka!” Hinata raises his voice and Kageyama pulls him a little closer. “Yes—yes! But… we can talk about it tomorrow. We should talk about it. I’ll text you in the morning. That way Kageyama can be there too.” _Be there for what?_ He squints at Hinata through the darkened bedroom, but there’s nothing in his face to explain what’s happened except astonishment. He doesn’t look upset, just—stunned. “Goodnight… t-thank you. Goodnight, Hitoka.”

Hinata lowers the phone. Kageyama waits, but for the first moment after the call ends Hinata just stares at the phone in his hand, lips parted. There had been something Yachi wanted to do, and Hinata thought they should talk about it, and they would all meet tomorrow to discuss it… nothing logical comes to Kageyama’s mind and he can’t help sounding frustrated when he finally loses patience and asks.

“So? What was that? What did she want?”

Hinata swallows and lifts his head, and twists himself around to face Kageyama. His eyes are shiny. “She wants to be our surrogate.”

A beat passes, and Kageyama becomes sure he’s misheard.

“What?” he says. “You don’t mean…” And then Hinata is wiping his eyes on his arm, shoulders shaking, and it must be—true, that’s the only thing it _could_ be. The only thing that could make him cry.

“She said she—it’s such a big thing, and she said she wants to do it, and she said she doesn’t want any money or anything, that she misses us…” Kageyama hugs him, not knowing if he should try to stop the crying or let it go on, or succumb to it himself. Yachi Hitoka wants to carry a person inside her uterus for nine months, as a favor to them. It’s an impossible thing to wrap his head around, almost, until he considers that it only takes one impossible thing to make all these other impossible things into reality—with Natsu’s help and this they have the first link in a chain reaction that will alter their lives forever. Hinata cries into Kageyama’s shoulder, and Kageyama smiles into his hair.

“It’s going to happen, Shou.”

Hinata shakes his head, pulling away enough to stare up into Kageyama’s face. “We can’t let her do that, it’s too much. She’s giving up too much—”

“She knows we need help and she wants to give it.” He pushes Hinata’s fringe out of his eyes. He wishes he could say this is a gift for him as much as it is for Hinata, but he knows better than that. Hinata and Yachi’s relationship has always been special, with its own unique character, just like his relationship with Kageyama, and with Kenma too. Like the sun that shares his name, Hinata means something different to everyone around him, but his centrality in their lives is never up for debate.

“That’s so kind,” he murmurs, pressing his face into Kageyama’s chest. “It’s amazing anyone could be so kind. Isn’t it amazing? Kageyama?” He doesn’t respond right away; he is too busy thinking that if Yachi needed Hinata to carry a person around in his stomach for most of a year on her behalf, he’d probably do it in a heartbeat.

“It’s very kind. Very amazing.” Kageyama echoes Hinata’s words and kisses his temple again.

“Wow. It’s going to happen.” Hinata says exactly what Kageyama said a minute ago, but as if it’s just occurred to him. Dumbass. “It’s going to happen,” Hinata repeats, more hysterical, and he starts climbing away from Kageyama and off the bed. “We have so much to do. We have to find a doctor, and we have to— _buy_ things! Baby things!”

“It’s midnight,” Kageyama reminds him.

“So!” Hinata throws his arms in the air; only he could go so quickly from tears of joy to manic insomnia. “We’ll make a list! We have to get up—”

“No.” Kageyama grabs one of his flailing arms and tries to still the fidgeting.

“I want to read all the books—baby books—where are my glasses? Have you seen them?”

“Come back to bed.”

“I have to—”

“Sleep.” Finally Kageyama gets him to sit, the struggle dwindling to small whines of resistance.

“I’m never going to be able to sleep like this,” Hinata says miserably. He isn’t wrong, Kageyama knows how it is when he’s in this mood. He leans in close and Hinata, caught off guard, ducks his head with unusual shyness. It’s sweet and hot, typical Hinata.

“I’ll distract you.”

“Oh.” Kageyama helps Hinata lie back and kisses his neck, admittedly with more enthusiasm than when they’re started this up before. “Is it weird to do this when we just found out we’re having a baby?” Hinata wonders above him.

“No, it makes sense.”

“How does it make sense?”

Kageyama props himself up on an elbow. “Do you know how little sex we’re going to be able to have once we have a kid?”

Hinata’s eyes widen. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“Yeah, well.” Kageyama slides a hand up his shirt, feeling the soft stomach and smooth chest. Unlike Hinata, he has thought of this a lot. Mourned it, really.

“We’re going to be so tired,” Hinata realizes out loud, mostly oblivious to the fact that Kageyama is taking off his shirt. “What if he walks in on us? What are we going to say?”

Kageyama groans and presses his forehead to Hinata’s. “This is not sexy.”

“Oh—sorry, you’re right! We have to get busy.” Hinata clamps his hands around Kageyama’s shoulders. “Should I get in your lap? Would that help?” Kageyama shuts his eyes and tries to roll away, since Hinata has begun _laughing_ , and not in a cute flirty way, in a mocking way, which makes Kageyama feel like whatever the opposite of a sex god is. “I could do a dance for you,” Hinata giggles. “I could wiggle. Would that be good?”

“Forget it,” Kageyama grunts, crawling back to his pillow, wishing he could sound more ambivalent and less hurt. He flops down with his back to Hinata.

“Kage _ya_ ma.” This is somewhere between a whine and an apology ( _I’m sorry, you big baby)._ When Hinata scoots in close, Kageyama reluctantly twists on to his back enough that they can look at each other. Hinata is biting back a smile. Cliche, he knows, but—it’s hard to stay angry with that face. “Kageyama, you’re going to be the father of my children.”

This surprises him. It takes a moment, but a tiny grin finds his mouth. “You’re an idiot.”

“That’s not sexy,” Hinata gasps; Kageyama kisses him again and they don’t talk much more that night, but they don’t stay quiet either.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Did you call Natsu?”

“Yeah, I told her everything went fine.”

“You’ll have to call her again, if…”

“I know, it’s fine!”

With that, things fall quiet between them again. Hinata gets the feeling Kageyama had only asked to make these minutes pass a little faster. Usually it’s Hinata himself, talking through a nervous silence—but right now he feels like the bubbly part of him has dried up. He can only stand there, jiggling his knee, while he and Kageyama lean on either side of the bathroom door. Waiting.

What happens today, he reminds himself, doesn’t determine the future. This is only their first try. They have savings—well, Kageyama has savings, and Hinata has Kageyama—so more attempts are possible. Natsu has already offered to donate again, as soon as she’s able. Not everything rides on today.

Except, if it _works_ —today could be the day.

The bathroom door slides open after what feels like an eternity, and Yachi steps into the hall, clutching a small, pink cardboard box.

She jumps to find them lurking on either side of her. “You’re both right outside!”

“Sorry,” Kageyama blurts, straightening up. Hinata can’t remember how to talk, his eyes are glued to the little cardboard box, and in his head there’s just one word, echoing over and over again: _baby baby baby baby baby baby baby._

Yachi gives a little shrug and a nod and looks between them, waiting. Eventually Kageyama seems to catch on (Hinata can’t, he’s past catching anything, if anything he’s dropping stuff now) and leads them into the living room to wait a few more minutes while the test develops. This time passes pretty much the same way it did when it was just him and Kageyama waiting—slow and stupid and frustrating.

And then the timer on Kageyama’s phone dings. The three of them look at each other; they look at the box sitting on the kitchen counter. “Does one of you want to check it?” Yachi asks slowly. Hinata can feel Kageyama staring at him, expectant, but he can’t take his own eyes off the box.

Ultimately he doesn’t answer; he just gets up, marches to the counter, and rips the thing in two trying to free the long white piece of plastic that determines whether or not today is the day.

It’s not until he’s staring down at the pregnancy test that he realizes he has no idea how to read it.

“Wait, what do I…” He looks up at Kageyama and Yachi and they’re both pale, stiff as boards, awaiting a verdict.

“There’s a little window—it says ‘pregnant’ next to it?” Yachi offers softly. “Is there a line in the window?” She seems torn over whether or not she should crane to see the results and fidgets in her seat. Kageyama stays stock still, his hands clasped between his knees.

“A line in the window. Yeah, there’s a line in the window—what does that mean?”

Hinata does expect to get a little more than just _silence_ in answer to this question. Yachi has stopped fidgeting, and Kageyama conversely gets to his feet, and turns his back to them.

“What does it mean?” Hinata says again, desperation bleeding into his tone. He waves the test at Yachi, now apparently the only person listening to him. If he doesn’t get an answer soon he’ll snap the thing in two.

Sounding distant, Kageyama mutters, “You’re so…”

Yachi pulls her hands from her knees and lays them on her stomach. “I’m pregnant.”

Oh.

The well of frustration and confusion that had build up around the pregnancy test melts into affection, just like that—he loves the little pee stick. He doesn’t even care that it’s a pee stick. They should frame it. The first of many pee-soaked pit stops along parenting road.

He starts yelling.

He makes it over to Yachi in two enormous bounds and sweeps her into a hug, and then he’s on to Kageyama before she can process the gesture. He doesn’t even stop to consider Kageyama’s strange reaction to the news, to register the expression of sheer panic and terror on his face as Hinata latches around his neck, shouting excited half-sentences. Hinata lets the inevitable happen in his partner—the half-second of apprehension, the necessary clearing of a psychological hurdle, the sense of _no turning back now_ —and then Kageyama hugs him back, tight, like Hinata knew he would. Hinata feels his feet leave the ground as Kageyama pulls him up, and clings to him. His toes dangle between them. He hopes that the baby will be tall, eventually, since it’s Kageyama’s baby. Their baby.

He stuffs his face into Kageyama’s shoulder and screams at the top of his lungs. He can tell Yachi and Kageyama are having a conversation over the top of his head, maybe wondering about his sanity, but why should they? Isn’t this supposed to be one of the best days of his life, so far? There are days he wouldn’t trade for the world, maybe too many, more than most people can name—but the day they beat Shiratorizawa, and the day he got together with Kageyama, and today. Those would be the big three, so far.

There is a hand stroking his hair, a voice in his ear. “Stop screaming.”

On cue, exhaustion floods him, and he slumps into Kageyama’s arms. He can feel himself being lowered to sit, the seating cushions seeming to swallow him up. His ears are ringing, he wonders if he blew them out himself. He registers that he’s sitting between Yachi and Kageyama, and both of them are smiling. The pregnancy test is sitting on the carpet in the center of the living room. He doesn’t remember dropping it.

“…have to get a blood test, to be sure,” Kageyama is saying to Yachi. “I don’t know how long you want to stay in Tokyo—”

“I blacked out,” Hinata realizes.

“More of a brown-out,” says Kageyama.

Yachi nods. “You were conscious the whole time.”

Hinata blinks into Yachi’s face, and then his eyes fall to her stomach. _Baby baby baby baby baby baby._

“Hitoka, you have to move in with us—”

Kageyama’s arm around his waist pulls him away from Yachi, since he’d gotten closer than comfortable in his zeal. “She doesn’t _have_ to do anything.”

“But we can help her out!”

“I want to work for as long as I’m able, I think.” Yachi touches her stomach again. Her voice is full of softness and patience and Hinata counts the two of them extremely lucky that she’s their friend. “But then I’ll come up to Miyagi, in the last few months, and I can… have the baby here,” she says, like she can’t quite believe the words _have the baby_ are coming out her mouth. Hinata nods, bouncing enough that the back of his head slams into Kageyama’s chin and they both whine. Yachi has been staying with them every other week, training back and forth between Sendai and Tokyo for doctor’s appointments and procedures, but never for more than a weekend at a time. The three of them living together for weeks at the end of the pregnancy, he imagines it being exciting, and comfortable, and _real_. Like a big adult sleepover that ends in the hospital, but better than it sounds.

“He’s really in there,” Hinata thinks out loud, looking at her stomach again. Yachi laughs nervously and Kageyama reaches forward to lift his chin, forcing Hinata to meet Yachi’s eye. 

“You can’t stare like that.”

He gives her a grin instead, then twists around to talk to Kageyama. “He’s in there, he’s a little—like a speck right now!”

“He?” Yachi repeats. “Do you want a boy?” There’s anxiety in her voice, like she doesn’t want to screw this up for them by popping out a girl.

Hinata shakes his head. “No, we don’t care, it’s just—”

“We suck at girls.”

“ _Kageyama_ sucks at girls.” Hinata grew up in a house of women, nearly married one. He’s never felt keen differences between himself and Natsu—at least, not because of their genders.

“All right,” Kageyama grunts, untangling himself from Hinata. “Then you can talk to her when she starts needing tampons.”

“I would love to!” Kageyama has gotten up and stomped off into the kitchen area, looking like he might be starting their lunch. Hinata calls after him, “Do you want to talk to her when she starts liking boys at school?”

“Shut up!”

Hinata laughs. Yachi is smiling. He feels drunk, almost, on the euphoria of the day. In the kitchen, there’s the sound of clanging pots and pans, and he smells soy sauce. He’s gotten used to this, Kageyama making food in another room, while he’s watching television or trying to work. It’s commonplace, but with Yachi sitting here, he starts to think how in less than a year, this scene will change.

“Shouyou—”

He jumps at Yachi’s voice and she seems equally startled. She always was skittish.

“Yeah?” He sinks back into the cushions. Yachi sits up, hands in her lap.

“If you… I… we—did have a girl.” Hinata tilts his head. His being open-minded aside, he’s been picturing them with a son. And it’s been awhile since he heard Hitoka refer to them as a _we_ , so that’s weird. “And you did ever want her to talk to another woman. I would do it.” Hinata sits up, and she flinches, not meeting his eye. “I know you have your mother and Natsu, it’s only if they weren’t available. Just in case. I know we haven’t talked much about what will happen after the baby is born.”

(It still bothers him when she gets self-effacing like this.)

(It will probably always bother him, as long as he cares about her. So probably forever.)

“You should absolutely be in the baby’s life, if you want to.” She glances up at him, as always taken aback by his confidence. “He… they wouldn’t exist without you, so you know!” He reaches over and squeezes her shoulder.

“Ah, t-thank you,” she stutters. “I would like to—to be a part, I mean.”

Hinata gives her a grin stretching ear to ear. “Then it’s settled. Welcome to the family.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Worse than the morning sickness and backaches, the strange cravings and spells of exhaustion—worse than all of it is trying to tell her mother.

The key verb being _try_ ; when she hangs up the phone after their conversation, she still doesn’t quite know how much of the plot her mother has grasped. Said plot got lost after she made it clear that she had _not_ gotten back together with Shouyou. Then came the question, “So it’s not his baby?” And Yachi had spluttered out some response about _technicalities_ and _unconventional situations_ and her mother’s voice got colder as she became resolute in her decision not to understand. Yachi didn’t get the feeling she’d been disowned, but more that she would not be invited to talk about this again, and the next time they saw each other—whenever that might be—the topic would be circumvented. Best as you can circumvent a pregnancy that’s 30-something weeks gone, anyway.

But all of that is in the future. While her stomach stays smooth, she remains in Tokyo, mostly alone. Shouyou or Kageyama will call every other night to check in, but no matter who’s holding the phone it’s always a conversation with the two of them.

“Hinata wants to know if you’ve looked at the books he sent.” And in the background she hears Hinata talking, too. (“Two books! I sent two books.”)

“They’ve arrived, but I’ve only peeked in them.”

“He bought us books too,” says Kageyama. (“I read the ones I sent Yacchan also!”) “You mean you read the first twenty pages.” (Hinata screeches angrily and Yachi doesn’t hear him for a while.)

“Um, yes, they’ve been helpful. They’re a bit scary…”

“I’ve been finding that too. I’m trying to finish every book he doesn’t.” Yachi laughs, she can see this clearly, Kageyama shuffling along behind Shouyou and picking up the trail of books left in his wake. “I don’t want us to have incomplete knowledge,” he explains seriously, not understanding her laughter.

“That sounds good! That sounds like a good policy to have.”

Another night she calls and this time Shouyou answers, sounding grave. When she asks what the matter is, he explains, “Kageyama is upset with me.” She can hear Kageyama’s voice somewhere in the background, and he sounds… himself. So, grumpy. But he doesn’t really seem to be speaking to Hinata.

“What happened?”

“I did something,” Hinata says sheepishly. “It’s just something I saw in a television show, that sometimes couples do it when they’re thinking about having children—for practice, you know? And I guess—well, it shouldn’t have been a _surprise,_ maybe.”

“What did you do?” Yachi asks, fighting off some panic-inducing flashbacks to the kinds of ‘surprises’ Shouyou had pulled on her during their time together. Once she’d come home to find the living room furniture moved to the bedroom and a tarp laid out over the floor; if she’d been gone ten minutes more, he might have succeeded in painting the entire room lime green, because he had read in a magazine that bright colors were good for anxiety. His gestures always came from the right place, they were just… ill-conceived.

There’s a long pause. Yachi hears a pan clattering in the distance. Shouyou sighs. “I got us a puppy.”

“A _dog_?” she gasps. “You’re going to have a baby in six months!”

“I wanted to practice potty training!”

“Now you’re going to have two children instead of one.”

“That’s what Kageyama said, too,” Hinata groans. “But she’s so cute, Yacchan! You can hold her with one hand, and she has this little black-and-white face and pretty blue eyes, and I saw her at the pound and she licked my hand and now she’s mine and I’m never letting her go away, ever.”

She mourns for Kageyama, but still, Shouyou’s stubborn declaration of affection makes her smile. “What are you going to call her?”

“Her name is Mikasa! Mika,” he chirps.

“Like…”

“The volleyball company, yeah!”

Yachi bites her lip. “Wow.”

“Oh, I’ve got to go, she’s peeing—”

The next time she calls she gets an earful from Kageyama about the dog situation, followed by a barrage of texts from Hinata containing pictures of Kageyama playing with the little creature, followed by what appears to be a quote from Kageyama himself:

(21:54) “ _this is the first animal that has ever liked me”_

So, overall she thinks the situation will probably work out for the best. Kageyama seems more adaptable to Hinata’s whims than any person she’s seen him with—and maybe that’s their secret. Or, one of them.

Gradually Yachi watches her lower stomach start to balloon. The first day she can’t get her jeans closed she flops back on her bed and stares down at it. There’s a thing in there. A human—hopefully. Not an alien. Regardless the idea terrifies her; she grins at her reflection in the mirror over her dresser.

She wants to go as long as she can without being identified as an unwed mother at her work, so she starts wearing all the dresses and big sweaters she can get away with in a professional environment. Thankfully fall is upon them, and she can bundle up the bigger she gets, but at the same time—something’s gotta give. The doctor in Sendai wanted her to stop working the moment the blood test came back positive.

When she finally takes her _undisclosed medical leave_ , she’s four months along, and—she thinks, or at least hopes—her coworkers are none the wiser about what she’s doing. Even in Tokyo, with so many foreigners and young people doing all sorts of weird things everyday, she doesn’t quite have the words to explain. And she definitely wouldn’t know how to begin if you asked her _why_.

The simple answer is, _for my friends_.

The longer answer has to do with thirty years of nothing extraordinary. It’s as much about Hinata and Kageyama and what they deserve as it is about her mother, and her job, and her ex-girlfriend who had left because she got _bored_.

Kageyama was right, after all: she is looking for something, but it’s not in the world. She wants to find something incredible inside herself. Everyone else has gotten that chance—sometimes, when you’re a person like Hinata Shouyou, you don’t even need to search for it. She isn’t like that, all her shimmery bits on the outside. She needs to hold something up to the light and say, _hey, see this? I made this amazing thing._

The boys (she still thinks of them this way, more often than she should) arrive at her apartment with their car, and load up her the suitcases. Kageyama helps her into the passenger’s seat. On the drive from Tokyo to Sendai, they talk for the first hour, and then Kageyama passes out in the back, and Yachi’s left to listen to Hinata singing along with the radio, the country rolling by along the freeway.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“At thirty you’re officially not young anymore.”

She finds herself laughing at the look on Kageyama’s face when Shouyou breaks this to him.

“Don’t worry!” he adds happily. “Hitoka and I haven’t been young for months.”

“We’re young compared to some people,” Yachi offers. She can’t say she feels totally old, not yet. But maybe she’s too distracted by the pregnancy. Right now it seems like her body is doing the opposite of shutting down—it’s as demanding as it’s ever been. Her belly is almost big enough to rest her hands on, as she sits here glued to the futon in her friends’ living room. Mikasa the puppy has camped out between her feet and fallen asleep in a fluffy puddle. The gentle rise and fall of the animal’s small chest calms nerves Yachi didn’t even know she had.

“Kageyama was born old, I think,” Shouyou decides. Further down the futon, they sit almost leaning against one another, but not quite—Hinata pokes his partner’s cheek and Kageyama grunts in reply, scooting forward to cut himself another slice from the birthday cake on the table. As seems fitting for late December, it’s chilly, light snow visible on the eaves of neighboring homes. She’s too big for most of her own sweaters, so Kageyama has lent her one, its sleeves hanging off her hands. “We should get a kotatsu,” Shouyou suggests, pulling his knees toward himself with a shiver.

“Wouldn’t be safe for the baby,” says Kageyama.

“It’s not for the baby, it’s for us!”

“Just use another blanket.” To demonstrate, Kageyama drags a throw from the back cushions right onto Hinata’s head. Yachi is laughing again—she doesn’t think she’s ever laughed so much as in the past week, staying here. Hinata and Kageyama are weird and funny and it’s nice enough being around people she knows well, even better that they’re excited to have her.

There’s a sudden pain in her back and she sighs, wincing. Pregnancy. Hinata sits up and stares down the couch at her.

“Are you okay!”

“Do you need anything?” Kageyama asks.

“No, it’s okay.” She starts scooting toward the edge of the couch. “I think I need to sit somewhere different for a while. Or maybe stand.” Her back is strange, you’d think it would _like_ the nice firm futon, but it complains anyway.

“So we’ll all stand,” Hinata decides, and in a whirlwind of blankets him and Kageyama are getting to their feet, and helping her get to her feet, ignoring Yachi’s vague protests and Mika starting to bark. “Oi, Kageyama! You know what we should do, we should go to Daito.”

“Mhf,” (?) says Kageyama, but he’s nodding, so Yachi assumes that’s a positive response.

“What’s Daito?”

“It’s our mountain! Where we go hiking!”

“A hike?” she repeats, a little shrill. She can’t remember the last time she went hiking, but it seemed like there were a lot of rocky downhill areas with slippery footing.

“Just a light one, Hitoka-chan.” Hinata bends down to address Yachi’s belly. “You’re going to go on a lot of hikes, so you might as well get started as early as possible.”

“There’s a really nice trail we go to,” Kageyama tells her. “After you’ve been walking a while you don’t even notice how cold it is.” Hinata makes an excited noise in agreement.

Admittedly, she stays skeptical. But it’s Kageyama’s birthday and his mouth is doing that wobbly thing it does when he’s excited, so she elects to toughen up. Changing her life means stepping outside her comfort zone, and in that respect she’s lucky she’s having a baby for people like Hinata and Kageyama and not some cookie-cutter couple, because opportunities pop up all the time. So she bundles herself in her secondhand, comically oversized winter coat, lets Kageyama help her into her snow boots, and piles into the car behind them. They leave a now-house-trained Mikasa to nap, worrying it will be too cold for her little feet; Hinata promises her many hikes in the future, on warmer days.

They drive forty-five minutes into the mountains with pack lunches. Most of the time is eaten up by the narrow winding roads, the elevation sneaking higher and higher. “We usually climb all three peaks,” Hinata explains, twisting to talk to her in the back seat. The only thing she can think about this is, _seriously?_ “But we don’t want you to overexert yourself, so we’re just going to do one today.” Eventually they reach an empty car park and get out; there’s still snow on the ground, but Kageyama promises her repeatedly that the way up from here is safe, and not too much of a climb, and the views are worth it.

Hinata goes first up the narrow trail, followed by slow and apprehensive Yachi, and Kageyama rounds up the rear, probably to reassure her. He was right about not noticing the cold after a while—as she moves she starts to warm up, and the views she can glimpse through the forest of leafless trees are enticing enough to distract her from what’s left of the chill. The incline challenges her but it’s not too bad, and they stop to rest every fifteen minutes or so without a peep of complaint from the boys. She never moves like this when she’s in Tokyo; it doesn’t feel bad, if not like she expected.

“What did you mean when you said this was ‘our’ mountain?” she calls up the trail to Hinata, who tests the footing around a rocky patch in the path.

“Oh, I meant, we always come here!”

Kageyama’s voice behind her explains, “We had our first date here.”

“Where? On the mountain?” she says, in disbelief.

“Kageyama made food and we hiked up to the top and ate together. And it was cold and snowy too, just like today!” Hinata pauses in the middle of the trail, and half turns back to them, thoughtful. “Kageyama, it’s your birthday.”

Yachi stops walking too, squinting up at Kageyama in confusion. Kageyama’s response is just, “Yeah. Dumbass.”

“Doesn’t that make it our anniversary too?”

Floored, Yachi turns to Kageyama now, anticipating his response with dread. He has his head bowed. A forgotten anniversary seems like a sign of the worst and she isn’t sure who’s at fault, or who’s about to get chewed out, as seems wont to happen with people as passionate and explosive as her friends.

Then Kageyama looks up, a tiny smile on his lips. “I guess it is.”

“Happy anniversary!”

“Happy anniversary.”

And Hinata turns and continues hopping up the trail, belting a Christmas carol at the top of his lungs.

Yachi can’t help squeaking in wonder, glancing between Shouyou’s back and the contented look on Kageyama’s face, feeling that she is missing something. “Your _anniversary_ ,” she says to Kageyama, as though she were pleading. He blinks at her, and gestures to the trail ahead.

“He’s winning.”

Open-mouthed, Yachi persuades her feet to keep moving, but she’s still thinking about how weird that was. Like, she didn’t know couples could be so weird. “How many years…”

“Hmph. Five.”

“ _Five years._ ” Her longest relationship was _one_. “Five years is half a decade,” she says, mostly to herself, steadying herself with the trees along the trail.

Kageyama makes a small, considerate _hmph._ “That’s true _._ ”

“Aren’t you going to do anything special?”

“This _is_ special,” says Kageyama simply. At first, Yachi doesn’t know how to respond—they would have had this outing regardless of their anniversary, but when she thinks about it for a moment, she catches that this might be the point. They don’t need to do something special, because everything they do together is already special.

“Congratulations,” she mutters, for more than just the anniversary.

“Thanks.”

After some more climbing they reach a plateau in the trail with a view in every direction. The three of them stand side-by-side for a long minute, staring out at the view in silence, their trio of breaths ragged and visible on the cold air. The hills go forever, the snow layer freckled with trees. The cloud cover is heavy and grey but on a clear day you might be able to make out a sliver of Sendai, or the coast, in the far distance. Her limbs feel light, like the burden of the climb has been shaken off; now they enjoy the fruits of their labor.

“Amazing,” mutters Hinata, shaking her arm. “It’s always amazing, every time.”

Eventually Kageyama sets up for their little meal: he cleans up a big rock, and covers it in a thick wool blanket, then helps Yachi sit. She feels glad that they did this, before she gets too big and can’t move anymore, and she listens to her boys talk over the food with a smile on her face.

Hinata announces he has to pee and makes for the trees, and as he goes Kageyama shouts after him about being careful with his footing when he goes off the path, dumbass, he should’ve gone at the trailhead anyway.

It is quiet between her and Kageyama for the first minute or so. She always finds it a little more challenging to make conversation with him, because they don’t know each other as well, and virtually everyone is harder to make conversation with than Hinata.

“Can I ask you something?”

She looks up from her bento. Kageyama’s head is turned, eyes on the peaks, but there’s no one else he could have been talking to. She gives him a nod.

“Why didn’t you get married?” Oh. He turns back to her, nothing of anger or impropriety in his face. Like he sincerely just… wants to know. “He won’t tell me anything about it. He just says you decided not to do it. But you broke up with him, didn’t you?”

She hasn’t had to talk about this in years, so it takes her a moment to find the words, and even then she can’t meet Kageyama’s gaze. She loves Shouyou, and she knows Kageyama loves him too, and he could come back at any moment.

“I’m sorry, that was probably too forward,” Kageyama announces after her silence grows profound.

“No, it’s all right!” It’s a fair question; she can understand, too, why Shouyou hadn’t been forthcoming with an explanation. It is her story to tell, in a lot of ways. “I think… we were very young. Shouyou is always impatient to be happy, you know?” She laughs a little. The corners of Kageyama’s mouth twitch. “We’ve been friends forever, and we like each other a lot.” Thinking about this brings it all back in raging color—sitting up until three in the morning, trying to talk around impenetrable problems. “But I didn’t want to be twenty-three and saying, ‘Well, I don’t know what I want, so this is fine.’ Sometimes I give up too easily… not that being with Shouyou is like giving up!” she adds quickly, though Kageyama doesn’t seem insulted. “But it’s just—we became friends because he taught me to stand up for myself. So I decided I didn’t want to get married.” Sitting back, hands on the slight roundness of her stomach, she bites her lip. “To a man, anyway. And we both deserved more. Shouyou deserves someone who’s crazy about him.”

Hard to say if it’s the cold or this statement, but Kageyama’s cheeks have gone pinker than before. He coughs, clears his throat, and delivers her a short nod with his eyes on the blanket. “I see.”

She admits, quietly, “I still don’t know what I want.”

“When it comes, don’t run away from it,” Kageyama tells her, with the same confidence he uses to talk about volleyball—as though this were one of the few areas where he could speak from absolute expertise.

Shouyou’s high voice tears through the clearing: “I almost fell and died! Haha!”

After a cup of still-scalding tea from a thermos, they pack up and prepare to head out. Yachi has started tottering toward the path when she realizes she’s alone. And she hears Shouyou again, somewhere behind her, whining.

“We’re on top of Daito, you’ve _got_ to.”

She peeks back at her companions: they’re facing each other, Hinata clinging to the front of Kageyama’s jacket, on his tiptoes. She meets Kageyama’s eye just as he’s saying, “Yachi is here.”

“It’s tradition—just one kiss!”

She realizes—they want to… she quickly turns away, embarrassed. “I’m not here! I’m not here!”

“Okay, fine,” Kageyama grunts. Yachi waits, her eyes screwed shut, until she starts wondering if they’re done yet and peeks. She hadn’t realized how much Kageyama had to stoop to make their kisses work. She turns away again and stands with her back to them, grinning, until Kageyama taps her on the shoulder and they start their descent.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Living with them makes her realize: she hasn’t spent a whole lot of time around couples.

Not that most couples are anything like Hinata and Kageyama. Or, she doesn’t expect they are. Maybe she understands relationships less than she thought.

What’s particularly strange about it is that she’s come into their home, and the lines drawn around topics like privacy are blurred. She can tell Kageyama still treats her presence as a public place—he hesitates to touch Shouyou when she can see, even something as innocent as a pat on the shoulder. Shouyou, on the other hand, seems content to act as if there were no secrets between the three of them; it takes a month before he figures out that Kageyama will clam up if he tries any kind of affectionate display in front of Yachi. And once he’s realized (and voiced his opinion that this is really really _stupid_ ) he still sneaks in a kiss on the cheek, every so often, as an act of protest against Kageyama’s policy.

But she can still see them—them, the couple, the singular entity. Their relationship doesn’t become invisible because they don’t kiss when she’s there. Some moments are impossible to hide, impossible to avoid.

Late nights where her weird pregnancy body demands she pee at midnight, and she plugs her ears to pad by their room, having learned the hard way that she’s better safe than sorry.

In the early evening, when they’re trying to piece together a meal, she catches sight of them around a corner, where they work in the kitchen. Shouyou waves a batter-coated spoon at Kageyama and giggles and says, “Lick it! I dare you!” And when Kageyama does they collapse into laughter.

One morning she wakes up, having gone to bed early, and finds them tangled up on the futon in the living room, Kageyama’s face in Shouyou’s armpit, both snoring.

They go on runs together, Mikasa bounding along beside them, a welcome addition to the growing family. They shop for groceries. Hinata knows what kind of shampoo Kageyama won’t use because he thinks it’s a scam; Kageyama knows what to put on which shelves in the kitchen, so that Hinata can reach what he uses most without tipping over everything.

When she’d decided to have a baby for her ex-fiancé, a small part of her had worried, inevitably, in spite of knowing those feelings were long gone, that she’d be jealous. And she _is_ jealous, but—it’s got nothing to do with the past, or with Shouyou himself. It’s this _life_ ; that’s the thing she envies. Not a who, but a what. The sense of settled, comfortable, completeness.

And she thinks, _well, at least I’ve accomplished one thing I came here to do_. But the hardest part is still to come.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Eight months. Hell.

She feels huge. Like a monster. Like she isn’t growing a person—like she _ate one_ and it’s stayed alive in her stomach, thumping on the walls, wanting to come out. The kicking was exciting at first, they’d all crowded around to feel the movement, but then it didn’t stop, instead keeping her up into the night, and the boys up with her. While they’re all sitting around suffering together, Kageyama tells Hinata, “The baby gets that from your side of the family.”

It turns out having a baby _for_ other people entitles you to their endless gratitude and devotion—or, maybe this experience wouldn’t be the same with anyone else, but Kageyama and Hinata have such focus and intensity and a practiced sense of teamwork, she sort of feels like a big sweaty volleyball getting passed between them. Hinata will help her climb into difficult pieces of clothing, and assist her in waddling to the living room, where there’s a craving-specific feast awaiting her, freshly prepared by Kageyama. The caregiving is nice of them, but it gets to a point when she’s ready to burst, where she doesn’t know how else she’d get by. So really they are just doing what they need to do to get their baby. It starts making sense to her why people are paid to do this.

The due date looms. “Only a month left,” Kageyama announces one day, making a note on the calendar in the kitchen.

And then it is Hinata: “Three weeks left!”

They’ve insisted on being surprised by the gender, so all sorts of pronouns get thrown around. “Two weeks… she’ll be a May baby,” Kageyama says.

“Any time now.”

The due date passes.

“A June baby would be good too…”

The due date passes by a _lot_. Every morning Yachi wakes up and thinks, _this is it, I’m dead_ , her stomach like a waterlogged balloon clinging to her body. _Enough, enough_. She can feel Hinata always staring at her lower half, which is kind of weird, but understandable. They are all hoping the thing will climb out of there, at some point. Yachi has been called endlessly patient, and even she’s getting impatient—she can’t imagine what it’s like for Shouyou and Tobio, who are the least patient people she’s met. Maybe this was designed to test them.

She’s a week and a half late and Kageyama is on the phone with the doctor, asking, “At what point do we induce labor?” And she panics. She can see the red around Shouyou’s cuticles where he’s chewed them raw in his nervousness. All this trouble to _have a baby_ , and she can’t even _have the baby._

Of course, with the waiting being so excruciating, the baby decides to come when they’re least expecting it.

She has finally managed to get comfortable in bed, ready to settle down for the night—always an effort when you’re hosting another human internally. The office-turned-future-kids-room-turned-temporary-guest-suite is dark around her, she’s dozing off. And then there’s a _pang_ somewhere deep inside her, and her eyes fly open.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s only after Kageyama starts looking like he might hit someone that the doctor finally agrees to let them both be in the delivery room. So naturally he’s annoyed when, as they’re standing there in blue scrubs, thoroughly washing their hands and arms per hospital guidelines, Hinata announces, “I don’t think I can do it.”

Kageyama is about to yell— _are you fucking kidding, now this doctor thinks I’m crazy, couldn’t you have realized this half an hour ago_ —and Hinata is white as a sheet. And going whiter at the look on Kageyama’s face.

So he tries to dial it back when he says, “Are you scared?”

“Not scared, I—” He rinses his hands, and shuts off the water, his gaze on the faucet hollow. “I watched a couple of birthing videos.” Oh, great. Kageyama had been concerned about this—he’d done the same thing and nearly been sick, and his stomach is iron compared to Hinata’s. He rinses and starts to dry his own hands.

“You don’t have to look, you can stand up top and hold Yachi’s hand.”

“I don’t want my first interaction with the baby to be me vomiting!”

“You’re sure you’ll vomit?”

“I already did, in the bathroom before,” Hinata says miserably.

Kageyama leans back, searching for a sign that he’s just nervous, and wanting some extra validation. But he just finds determination in Hinata’s expression—he’s made his decision. Kageyama lowers his head.

“Okay. Then I’ll wait outside too.”

Hinata’s eyes widen. “Wait, why!”

“Because I want to meet the baby at the same time as you.”

Hinata stares at him, smiles weakly, and then throws his arms around Kageyama’s chest. The sound of the plastic scrubs crinkling would make their hug weird and awkward if not for the context. Kageyama presses his face into the top of Hinata’s head. They inhale together, and then leave to find a nurse.

Yachi doesn’t react much to the news that they won’t be joining her in the delivery room, mostly because she’s preoccupied trying to frantically absorb every word the middle-aged, clean-cut, no-nonsense midwife offers in between contractions. Hinata thanks her for everything she’s done for them and she just whines through her teeth, and squeezes his hand so hard his knees buckle. When Kageyama sees that, he starts to feel slightly better about not being in the room for the birth. They would be window dressing, nothing more. In spite of how hard they’ve tried to ease the way for her and show their gratitude, this final task is Yachi’s to complete.

But that only leaves waiting, and final hours feel like another nine months. They sit in the back of the room while the labor goes on, crawling toward delivery. Kageyama gets them tea and shoots off a text to the neighbor, asking if they might be able to let Mika out. He comes back and, as soon as he’s seated again, Hinata slots halfway into his lap, head in the crook of his neck. His eyes are watery. “You _are_ scared,” Kageyama murmurs.

“No!” His nose wrinkles. “Aren’t you?”

“Yeah. It’s scary.” Kageyama has read too much about what can go wrong, too much that he can’t forget. “The odds of there being complications are slim.”

“Complications?” Hinata blinks over at the bed, where the midwife speaks to a rapt Yachi. “There won’t be complications. She’ll be perfect.”

“‘She’? You sound sure.”

“I’m sure of it now. ‘She’ is right.”

Kageyama feels his lips twitch. He reaches up and gently flicks the spot between Hinata’s brows, making his face scrunch. “Dumbass.”

“Don’t be cute with me, Kageyama.” Kageyama grins and nestles into his neck, ignoring Hinata’s stream of indignant, disgusted noises.

After another six hours, they are both feeling altogether less cute.

Actually, Hinata is still cute, because he’s asleep on Kageyama’s shoulder. Which is infinitely better than how he was before, pacing the length of the room and talking non-stop, making everyone—including (and worst of all) Yachi—feel even more stressed out.

Kageyama would be dozing too, but the contraction whimpers are keeping him wired. Every hair standing on end. He clings to Hinata’s limp hand.

Going on hour seven, Kageyama starts at a commotion from the bed. A nurse has arrived, repeating something about ten centimeters that sounds familiar to Kageyama, and then she and a small army of medical personnel are wheeling the hospital bed out of the room. Stirred from slumber, Hinata climbs off Kageyama to watch them leave.

“Bye, Hitoka! Bye! Thank you!”

Yachi twists back and, meeting Hinata’s eye with a hysterical look, makes a horrified squeal before disappearing down the hall.

The last nurse out turns to them and bows. “You can wait here.”

“More waiting,” Hinata groans, flopping back into Kageyama’s lap with a defeated pout.

“It’s okay.” Kageyama’s voice sounds too smooth in his ears. “This is the last of it. In a little while we’re going to be parents.”

The thought seems to console Hinata for a minute or two, but then he’s pacing again. “I need a distraction.”

“Wanna go to the canteen?”

“I can’t eat right now,” he says, rubbing his belly sadly.

“All right.” Kageyama has a thought, and starts rifling through the backpack he’d grabbed as they headed for the hospital, almost ten hours ago now. It’s light outside now, the mid-morning. They could both use some fresh air, but the baby could be here any second now. “Come here.” Hinata inhales deeply and obeys, seating himself like it’s almost painful to sit still. Kageyama pulls out the thick, familiar packet of paper and hands it to Hinata. “Look at this.”

“ _Contract of employment_ ,” Hinata reads, squinting. “ _Tohoku University Volleyball Club_ —what’s this, your job thing?”

“A new one.”

“A new one?” Hinata doesn’t understand. Kageyama points to the first paragraph, and Hinata reads, “ _Head Coach_ —” He lifts his head with such genuine surprise and excitement it makes Kageyama’s face hot. “They offered you—”

“Last week.”

Hinata does the best he can do to tackle him. “Kageyama!”

“I know!”

Then he snaps from delight to incredulity. “You didn’t _tell me_.”

“We had a lot of other stuff on our minds. Still do.” He takes the contract back, lowering his head. “We should talk about it more, but it makes the most sense to turn it down.”

Hinata sits backs. “ _What?”_

“It’s more hours and we’re about to have a newborn.”

“But it’s more money, isn’t it?” Hinata tries to wrestle the contract back from him. “We need that money! For diapers and baby food and—she’s going to be growing!”

“ _Hinata._ ”

“No! I know you wouldn’t start until next April and you’ve already got some paternity leave.”

It’s hard to admit that he’s making some good points, so Kageyama jerks the contract out of his hands and says firmly, “I’ll think about it.” He can’t say this isn’t something he wants.

Hinata’s annoyance melts into a shaky grin. “Do you ever think about how awesome our lives are?”

Kageyama doesn’t expect that kind of question, out of nowhere, and said with such plain happiness; it floors him. Hinata is good at being happy in a way that Kageyama has emulated more and more, as they’ve stayed together. He can see good things for exactly what they are and say it’s so, and no matter how settled Kageyama becomes he will never not think it amazing. More amazing than all the amazingness Hinata sees is his ability to see it where no one else could. He saw it in Kageyama himself, saw it in Yachi. It’s not so hard to find _awesome_ in their lives as they’re sitting here waiting for the birth of their first child but shit, the way Hinata just _says_ it.

“Kageyama,” he laughs. “Are you okay? You look weird.”

A movement at the door interrupts them: the nurse who had told them to wait just ten minutes ago has returned, breathless, to summon them. “Congratulations… come with me.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Afterwards there are a few things she things she needs.

A psychiatrist.

A drink.

But most importantly, she needs to be there when Hinata and Kageyama meet that baby. She can hear herself babbling to the nurse, delirious with pain. “I want to hold her, I want to give her to them.”

They slot a warm bundle into her arms. It takes more strength than she would have thought to look down and see the little pinkish-grey wrinkled face, eyes not quite open. “They all look like that when they come out,” says the nurse. Yachi can’t even reply. Her mouth hangs open.

A tiny person.

She catches their voices when they enter the room. Kageyama saying, “Calm.” Hinata saying, “Daughter.”

They stop at the foot of the bed, looking worse for wear, maybe almost as bad as her. The nurse has made them put their scrubs back on, and surgical masks too. She smiles at them.

“How are you doing, Hitoka-chan?” Hinata manages.

“I’m doing fine.”

A long pause.

By some miracle, she finds the energy to raise her arms slightly, offering them the bundle, the creature swaddled in white. They exchange a look, they know she is telling them— _come meet your child_ —but there’s hesitation.

Kageyama says, “You go first.”

“No…”

“I’ll come with you.”

Hinata swallows and nods. They walk around the bed, to Yachi, and Hinata extends his arms to take the baby carefully from her. The bundle makes a noise, a gurgle, and Hinata _gasps_ , as if he’s just heard music for the first time. He holds her with every inch his arms have to offer, completely, pulling her to his chest. Kageyama stands behind him, hands on his partner’s shoulders, squeezing.

The looks on their faces. You’d have to see it to believe it, and even having seen it, Yachi isn’t quite sure she does. But this—this is the reason the human race has survived so long. Hinata cracks a smile that makes his whole face bloom and she watches Kageyama’s eyes flicker between him and the baby, and start to well with tears.

He tries to wipe them on the back of his hand. “Shit.”

“Tobio, she’s just born and you’re already being vulgar in front of her.” But Hinata looks up, and sees what’s happening, and he starts to laugh.

“I’m sorry, Hitoka. Don’t look,” says Kageyama, a little garbled from crying, as he tugs down Hinata’s mask, then his own, and lifts the edge of his scrubs to shield her view of them kissing. He really has nothing to apologize for. Not even the pain.

When they pull away from the kiss, Hinata’s face is wet, too. He insists it’s Kageyama’s turn to hold her, but Kageyama can’t seem to do this standing up, so they let Yachi hold the baby again while they drag the room’s sofa up to the bedside, and she gets to hand Kageyama his daughter for the first time like she did with Shouyou.

They sit together on the couch and take inventory of her: her wormy little fingers and short nose and pudgy wrists; the small lick of black hair at the crown of her head. The first time she wiggles her arm they both freeze, eyes going huge, looking from Yachi to the baby urgently. Kageyama puts his finger in her hand, testing, and she grasps it; Hinata shoots off the couch to run a lap around the room.

“She looks like you,” Hinata decides, after they’ve calmed down. Soon they will have to give her up for a while, for routine procedures—and Yachi can tell by looking at them that those are going to be the longest few hours of their lives so far.

“I think she looks like _you_.”

“That’s because you want her to look like me.”

“ _You_ want her to look like _me_.”

“No,” says Hinata brightly. “I want her life to be easy!”

Kageyama gives him a glare and Hinata—once again holding the baby—grins down into his daughter’s face.

“I can’t wait until you’re old enough to make jokes at Papa’s expense.”

This brings a question to Yachi’s mind. “Are you both going to be Papa?”

Hinata shakes his head. “Kageyama is Papa, I’m Tousan. Otousan when she’s older.”

Kageyama talks like he hasn’t been listening to any of this—he’s staring down at the baby over Hinata’s shoulder, entranced. “She’s alive.”

“Of course she’s alive.”

“June 5th, 10:49 AM, 2.8 kilograms,” he recites. “Small. She does look like you.”

“She’ll become a giant! This is a future olympian we’re talking about.”

The nurse returns. At the looks on their faces when she takes the baby from them, she winces.

“I miss her,” Hinata moans, settling into Kageyama’s side.

“An hour old and you’re already stifling her with your clinginess.”

Yachi laughs and they both start, turning to look at her. They had forgotten her, probably, being so absorbed in each other and the baby, and she’d just been sitting and watching them, quiet and happy and her senses dulled by the pain meds.

“Hitoka,” says Shouyou, surprised. “How are you feeling?”

In spite of the fact that he’s already asked her this, she answers the same, “I’m doing fine.”

Kageyama mutters something, probably a reprimand, in Hinata’s ear, and earns himself a dirty look. Then he says, “It hurts like hell, right?”

She shrugs. “Morphine.”

Hinata bites his lip. “If it hurts a lot you probably don’t want a hug, right? Because I owe you a bunch of them.”

The drugs are great—she smiles wide, and throws open her arms. “I want a million.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Both of us have really bad handwriting,” Hinata explains, when they ask Yachi to do the calligraphy for the baby’s nameplate, but she suspects there is more to it than that. And she doesn’t want to question the honor they’ve given her. From what she knows, it’s a role usually reserved for a parent. But they’re right, she probably makes this proud display item look prettier than either of them could have.

When the ink has dried, they frame the traditional card and Kageyama sets about hanging it on the living room wall with everyone watching, mouths full of red rice.

“This is the most unconventional Oshichiya I’ve ever been to,” says Ito. Natsu’s nose wrinkles.

“You’ve never been to an Oshichiya.”

“It takes one to know one!”

Hinata holds the baby like an extension of himself—they’ve been home with her not four hours and he has already settled into zipping around the apartment with his precious cargo, around relatives and furniture and the dog. “It’s not level,” he informs Kageyama loudly, while his partner adjusts the nameplate on the wall.

“I’m working on it!”

“Niichan, bring her back here, I want to hold her again!”

“Not unless you wash your hands, I saw you petting Mika just now.”

From her seat at the head of the table, Yachi inhales the friendly commotion. After a week in the hospital, per doctor’s orders, she’s happy to be back in a real home. She’ll stay here for another couple of weeks, recuperating, and helping them work out the feeding situation, before she heads back to Tokyo.

Hinata’s mother sits to her left, and touches her arm lightly. “How are you, Hitoka-chan?”

“I’m well! I’m all right.”

“You have to take care of yourself,” she says, half to herself, remembering. “It’s the hardest thing on a body. But you did something very good.” Her eyes drift over to Shouyou and Kageyama, still working on the nameplate. “I knew you were going to make my son happy. Some way.”

“Okay, I’m _leaving it,_ ” Kageyama announces, stepping away from the wall at last.

“Perfect!” Hinata chirps. Kageyama throws him a scowl, but when Hinata offers him the baby he quickly accepts her, annoyance forgotten.

They make a little presentation to the assembled friends and family. Not just anyone gets invited to a naming ceremony, and Yachi feels out of place for a moment until she remembers she gave birth to this child. She has as much of a right to be here as anyone.

Hinata talks with his hands behind his back, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “We just wanted to thank you all for making it possible for us to do this. You all helped in different ways. It really does take a village, I guess!”

Kageyama adds, “Thank you for overcoming your doubts to support us.” Yachi sees Hinata’s mother smile.

“We wanted to, uh,” Hinata glances at Kageyama and Yachi starts to get the feeling they practiced this earlier. “—welcome a new daughter to our family. Which means you all.” He turns back to them squarely, beaming. “Not a very big family, but a good one.”

With that, the boys bow together, Kageyama especially careful of the baby in his arms. Their audience of four puts up a round of applause, and they chorus as one, “ _Welcome, Hinata Ren_ ,” echoing the name on the wall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i sure do love kagehinayachi.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks to kim who requested this fic and made the entire thing possible, as well as to the people i talked to/am talking to over the course of writing it!! a lot of head canon and information swapping went into this.


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